This fourth instalment of the ForestPaths Features series, which translates the project's research findings into concise, accessible summaries for policymakers, practitioners and other stakeholders, focuses on the effects of forest management on animal biodiversity in Europe and beyond.

Forests across Europe are under increasing pressure from commercial management, yet the consequences for animal biodiversity remain poorly understood at a policy-relevant level. Without a clear picture of how different management practices affect wildlife, efforts to design more nature-friendly forestry risk being misdirected or insufficient.

To address this, partners (PBL and KIT) from ForestPaths set out to quantify the biodiversity impacts of the most common forest management systems in Europe and globally. Drawing on three combined global biodiversity databases, expanded to reduce the longstanding bias towards tropical biomes, the study analysed species-level abundance data for vertebrates and insects across a range of management types, from clear cutting and forest plantations to selective cutting and reduced-impact logging.

Using mean species abundance (MSA) as a standardised measure of biodiversity intactness, the analyses reveal significant reductions of 56–63% in animal biodiversity in managed European forests compared to natural, unmanaged systems — with little meaningful difference between management types. Globally, the picture varies more: selective cutting followed by natural regrowth reduces biodiversity by 23–47%, while forest plantations drive losses of 56–80%. Over an 80-year period, biodiversity intactness recovers by approximately 70% in global forest plantations, compared to around 25% in European plantations. The limited distinction between management systems in Europe may reflect gaps in the evidence base; approaches such as shelterwood cutting and close-to-nature forestry remain understudied. Two research priorities are identified: testing whether active tree planting inhibits biodiversity recovery relative to natural regrowth, and examining how the composition of surrounding landscapes affects regeneration outcomes.

These findings make clear that current forestry practices across Europe come at a significant cost to wildlife and that the transition to more biodiversity-smart management is both necessary and achievable. By identifying where the evidence is weakest and where the greatest opportunities lie, this research provides a foundation for more informed forest policy across the continent.

Read the full ForestPaths Feature here.