About

Our faculty are engaged and dedicated educators, advisors, and mentors and have been honored with numerous university-wide and national teaching awards. Our classes emphasize the latest research coupled with cutting-edge technology and practices making our graduates among the most competitive candidates in the country for natural resource professions. Our curricula include everything from protected lands management and urban forestry, to industrial forestry operations and ecology. Small class sizes and faculty dedicated to teaching afford FREC students the chance to get to know their professors personally. Wide varieties of academic and professional opportunities are available through research, student organizations, and public outreach programs organized by the faculty.

Research topics

• Economics
• Geography
• Forestry
• Agricultural economics
• Ecology
• Business
• Environmental science
• Agroforestry
• Natural resource economics
• Biology
• Demography
• Economic growth
• Microeconomics

Selected publications

• Landowner Optimal Streamside Management Zone Width Decisions in Forest Harvesting

  Journal of Forest Economics · 2025-07-24

  article

  We examine a landowner’s problem of deciding on streamside management zone (SMZ) width under common regulatory constraints concerning water protection standards, assuming there is a prototypical landscape consisting of a productive planted forest and a stream buffer area of fixed starting width. We characterize an optimal width of these riparian buffer forests, and we determine how this decision depends on features such as expected erosion value, SMZ slope, and soil type. We also examine the intensity at which a landowner chooses to harvest within the SMZ, assuming they have the option to do so. The jointness of the decision on SMZ width and its harvesting intensity with other decisions such as rotation ages of the productive forest is analyzed theoretically and through a simulation for a prototypical pine forest in Virginia, United States. We show how several landscape and decision factors may influence SMZ decisions while still allowing the landowner to maximize land value. Given an acceptable rate of sediment delivery to the stream and tax incentives to set aside land as a buffer area, we find that (1) higher SMZ slopes, finer soil texture and higher harvest rates within the SMZ in general lead to a wider buffer area; (2) the impact of harvest intensity on sediment retention may change the optimal SMZ width, productive forest rotation age, and SMZ harvest intensity combination. We also find that not harvesting within the SMZ (even when allowed) might be optimal in the presence of a tax incentive depending on the effects of harvest intensity on soil retention and despite the value of timber in the buffer forest. Our model and results can be used to inform future policy aimed at reducing sediment runoff from harvesting operations into water bodies while simultaneously improving land value for the landowner and promoting sustainable water resource management.

  PublisherDOI

• Improving Environmental Outcomes Through Investments in Local Governance: Evidence from Brazil

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Does land tenure security reduce deforestation? Evidence from the Brazilian Amazon

  World Development · 2025-11-19 · 2 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Deferred rotation carbon programs for even-aged forests: Aligning landowner and societal objectives

  Forest Policy and Economics · 2024-08-01 · 6 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• A Stochastic Production Frontier Analysis of Factors That Affect Productivity and Efficiency of Logging Businesses in Virginia

  Journal of Forestry · 2024 · 1 citations

  • Environmental science
  • Forestry
  • Agroforestry
  PublisherDOI

• Current constraints to reconcile tropical forest restoration and bioeconomy

  Sustainability Science · 2024-10-22 · 10 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Large-scale forest restoration is vital for delivering a broad array of ecosystem services benefits to society. However, it is often perceived as an economically noncompetitive land use choice. Integrating economic opportunities into restoration aligns socioeconomic and environmental goals, reducing conflicts between forest production and conservation-oriented management decisions. Supply chains focusing on high-value goods can enhance the reach of forest restoration efforts and unite ecological and economic benefits in a multifunctional manner. The bioeconomy has emerged as a potential but critical driver for attracting investments in restoration. We outline the challenges and solutions to reconcile forest restoration and bioeconomy, specifically about (i) native timber production, (ii) non-timber forest products, (iii) biotechnological products, and (iv) intangible ecosystem services. This requires collaborative and multidisciplinary efforts to improve investment in large-scale projects. The intricacies of these issues intersect with research development, market dynamics, legal frameworks, and regulatory paradigms, underscoring the necessity for nuanced and tailored public policy interventions. These integrated approaches should enable tropical countries to lead the global forest-based economy and usher in a new era of forest restoration. Graphical abstract

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Perceived Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Private-Sector Urban and Community Forestry in the Southern United States

  Arboriculture & Urban Forestry · 2023-10-06 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Background Private-sector urban and community forestry (U&CF) is a major segment of the green industry with substantial socio-ecological and economic contributions to urban and sub-urban communities. The COVID-19 pandemic reportedly caused heterogeneous impacts on businesses, the workforce, and various sectors of the overall economy. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the perceived impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on private businesses carrying out U&CF activities in the Southern United States. Methods Using data collected through an online survey distributed across the Southern USA in 2021, we developed and estimated an empirical model to evaluate the factors describing the perceived impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on U&CF businesses in the region. Results Results suggest that COVID-19 had, on average, a neutral impact on the U&CF activities performed by the private sector in the study region, but the perceived impacts varied by the industry types. Results from the ordered logistic regression suggest that nursery and garden supply stores were more likely than other businesses to have a positive impact of COVID-19 on the U&CF segment of their business. Similarly, business metrics such as the size of the company in terms of annual sales and revenues or longevity in the business were found to be significant factors explaining the COVID-19 impacts on U&CF business. Conclusion Our study findings are useful for U&CF decisionmakers for better planning, preparedness, and programming of U&CF activities and businesses in the southern USA.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Economic Contribution Analysis of Urban and Community Forestry in the Southern United States in 2019

  Journal of Forestry · 2023-05-01 · 1 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Incentives for Rural Households to Establish Tree Cover on Agricultural Land in Andhra Pradesh, India

  2022-10-25 · 1 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  We explore the incentives of farmers to establish forest cover on agricultural land in Andhra Pradesh, India. A large body of theoretical economic work on land-use decisions examines the opportunity costs of switching land uses from agriculture to forest production (Parks and Hardie 1995; Haim 2011; Amacher et al. 2009), but empirical work that estimates the drivers of margin changes for these problems is still needed (Park et al. 1998). Based on a large dataset collected using a randomized survey of farm households in the East and West Godhavari regions in Andhra Pradesh, we use a multilevel mixed-effects probit model to analyze the decision to plant trees on private lands. We find that the most important positive drivers in the decision to plant trees are total land area, years of land tenure, and off-farm labour opportunity. However, factors that lower tree planting incentives are irrigation availability, average travel time to managed plots, elevation, and belonging to the scheduled tribes’ social group. Moreover, we find evidence that the probability of tree planting is not only associated with important fixed effects (the same across all households in our sample), but it is also associated with random effects that vary from village to village and with the number of plots that the household manages.

  PublisherDOI

• Análise financeira da produção de Cernambi na Floresta Nacional Do Tapajós com a ferramenta Green Value

  Biodiversidade Brasileira · 2022-11-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  A produção e venda de produtos florestais não madeireiros por populações tradicionais dependentes de florestas constitui importante fonte de renda e susbsistência. As cooperativas têm apoiado de modo crescente essas atividades econômicas através da assistência técnica e/ou de ajuda no acesso a mercados. No entanto, há escassez de informação no que se refere aos custos e benefícios provenientes da extração de produtos florestais não madeireiros para a famílias e sobre as iniciativas de apoio implementadas por cooperativas. Esse tipo de análise é fundamental para o planejamento operacional, para a tomada de decisões futuras e, assim, para a sustentabilidade financeira da atividade extrativista. Apresentamos uma análise financeira da produção de cernambi (borracha natural coagulada extraída da espécie arbórea Hevea brasiliensis) por famílias que habitam o interior e o entorno da Floresta Nacional do Tapajós e que são apoiadas pela Cooperativa Mista da Floresta Nacional do Tapajós -- COOMFLONA na região Oeste do Pará. A análise é realizada com base na metodologia "Green Value: Uma ferramenta para a análise financeira simplificada de iniciativas florestais" desenvolvida especificamente para uso de empreendimentos florestais comunitários. Nossos resultados mostram que a produção de cernambi, Ã época da análise, era rentável e constituía importante fonte de renda para o produtor familiar. Porém, a rentabilidade do produtor dependia do apoio da COOMFLONA na etapa de comercialização e escoamento, cuja rentabilidade mostrou-se negativa. A análise permitiu a avaliação de vários cenários alternativos assim como a identificação dos gargalos da produção e uma discussão em torno de soluções potenciais.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Gregory S. Amacher

  5 shared

• Rajan Parajuli

  North Carolina State University

  3 shared

• Kelly M. Cobourn

  Virginia Tech

  3 shared

• Leo Eduardo De Campos Ferreira

  2 shared

• Joannès Guillemot

  Université de Montpellier

  2 shared

• Austin Lamica

  2 shared

• Jason Gordon

  2 shared

• Stephanie Chizmar

  Southern Research Station

  2 shared