Principles for Management of Community Forests

The New England Forestry Foundation recognizes that its forests provide numerous goods and benefits, including among others:

• Forest products
• Periodic income to NEFF
• Community and regional economic value
• Protection of water quality
• A variety of habitats, including some for rare and endangered species
• Biodiversity
• Protection of cultural, historic, and archaeological resources
• Opportunities for recreation, education, and solitude
• Opportunities for demonstration, experimentation, and innovation

In managing its lands, NEFF is committed to an overarching principle of sustainability and will:

• Preserve site productivity
• Manage so as to maintain the biological and economic integrity of the land
• Manage with humility, recognizing the limits of our knowledge
• Think beyond the property boundary and consider the potential off-site consequences of our activities
• Be a good neighbor and consider its obligations to the community in which it is located
• Develop management plans within both an ecological and human context, considering the full range of forest values
• Assess the consequences of ranking values
• Maintain current management plans, basing them on economically practical natural resource assessments
• Consider and take advantage of demonstration opportunities
• Manage adaptively
• Document, analyze and disseminate results

Effective January 1, 2000