To meet the goal of the Paris Agreement, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions must be reduced urgently. This will entail transformation of all the major sectors of society, and all available measures and technologies must be considered.

Experts in areas of forest management and climate change mitigation represent different viewpoints on where to prioritize to meet the goal, and the scientific literature provides a variety of views on how different forests and forest management options can be adapted to climate change - as well as divergences in view on how they affect climate. To facilitate dialogue between these experts, KSLA - the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry - organized a 2-day international conference on March 12th-13th 2018 with the goals of: 1) clarifying why experts who accept the same evidence draw very different conclusions concerning the influences of forests and forest management on the climate; and 2) identifying knowledge gaps and priorities for future research and data collection.

This report summarizes the discussions at the event addressing forest management, forest-climate interactions, and the potential roles of forestry-derived feedstocks in the energy and material systems. The conference was structured around questions identified as crucial to the ongoing debate on forests and climate to help advance scientific understanding and to identify knowledge gaps and priorities for future research and data collection.