Open geo-spatial data for sustainable forest management: Lithuanian case

Abstract

In Lithuania, forests are managed by Lithuanian State Forest Enterprise, municipalities, ministries, etc. and private forest owners. About 50% of all forest land is State importance, privately owned forests cover 40% of forest land, and about 10% of forest land belongs to forests reserved for restitution. Forest management of private ownership force many challenges, because private forest owners are people, who have purchased or received the property after restitution, and often lacks knowledge about forest resources, its dynamics and sustainable forest management. As remote sensing is a valuable source for forest monitoring, because it provides periodic data on forest resource and condition status, these methods are gaining increased attention worldwide. In this context, more scientific efforts are made at developing remote sensing derived geo-spatial data services for sustainable forest management through a web service platform, which would integrate geo-information into daily decision making processes and operation for private forest owners. This article presents a review of privately owned forests’ statistics, questionnaire-based survey about GIS usage and demand for forest owners in Lithuania and links available sources of open geo-spatial data useful for sustainable forest management.