Forest Resilience series wins James Cup for second year running

A series on Forest Resilience in British Forests, Woods & Plantations in the Quarterly Journal of Forestry should be “compulsory reading for anyone involved in deciding or advising on managing and creating forests for the future”, according to one of the judges of this year’s prestigious James Cup Award.

Jonathan Spencer, MBE, former Head of Planning and Environment, Forest Enterprise, won the James Cup for the second year as the series continued to wow readers and judges

One judge described Part 3 of the series, Past and Future Forests in Britain, which appeared in the April 2019 issue as: “Superbly written – outstanding. It is full of new information using the past to help with looking forwards, making the reader think hard about future challenges and hinting at some new ideas.”

Another said: “With the others in the series, it should be compulsory reading for anyone involved in deciding or advising on managing and creating forests for the future.”

Last year Jonathan had won the award for the first two parts of the series which had been published in 2018

You can read all four of Jonathan’s resilience papers here  .

Jonathan said: “I am surprised and delighted to receive such recognition for the second year running. Since work on the four-part account was started back in 2017 the impact of climate change has become more obvious, more extreme, and yet more apparent.

“If this work helps in promoting an understanding the challenges ahead for forest managers and an appreciation of some of the measures we might take to make our woods and forests more resilient then I will be very pleased. Being awarded the James Cup is a real honour, but hopefully it will also draw more attention to the need to plan and prepare for the changes we shall have to make in the years ahead.”