Southern Research Station Headquarters - Asheville, NC
Main Logo of Southern Research Station, Stating: Southern Research Station - Asheville, NC, with a saying of 'Science you can use!'
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Congressional Corner

Southwide Initiatives

Emerging Issues in the South

For an in-depth look at State-by-State summaries & forest facts:





The Southern Research Station is part of the Nation's largest forestry research organization -- USDA Forest Service Research and Development -- the leading organization for research on natural resource management and sustainability in the United States. Headquartered in Asheville, North Carolina, the Southern Research Station serves 13 Southern States and beyond. Its staff of over 130 scientists is organized into Research Work Units with science technicians and other support personnel, who work at various locations throughout the region: Federal laboratories, universities, and experimental forests.

Since the beginning of the 20th Century, the Southern Research Station's researchers have excelled in studies on temperate and tropical forests, forest resources, and forest products and activities. These studies provide a wealth of long-term data sets and conclusions on the dynamics of tree plantations and natural stands, watershed management, and wildlife habitats. Guided by a Strategic Framework updated in 2006, our mission is to create the science and technology needed to sustain and enchance southern forest ecosystems and benefits they provide. Forest Science in the South - 2006 summarizes budget information, highlights the year's accomplishments, and list publications.



Small logo of the USDASmall logo of the Forest Service Shield



Emerging Issues in the South

Threat Assessments
The health and competitiveness of Southern forests is being impacted by changing local and global markets, invasive species, shifting consumer demands, and declining economic viability of the private forest landowner. There are ways to both promote the conservation ethic, manage forests for a multitude of resources (traditional and nontraditional), and provide economic gains to the landowner.

Program Overview

The Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center (EFETAC) was chartered in 2005 in response to the Healthy Forest Restoration Act of 2003 (HFRA) and is charged with predicting, detecting, and assessing environmental threats to public and private forests and wildlands. The Center identifies multiple interacting stresses (e.g., insects, climate change, wildland fire, and urbanization), and is working to generate new knowledge and develop tools that allow land managers to anticipate and respond to threats effectively.

The Center has joined forces with government agencies, universities, and non-governmental partners to leverage resources and improve the collective capacity to prepare for and respond to environmental threats.





Program Highlights

[PHOTO] House covered in Kudzu EFETAC is rapidly becoming a national leader in developing knowledge and tools to address multiple threats affecting forests in the Eastern U.S. The Center’s scientists and staff are engaged in multiple collaborative projects at the forefront of technology development and application in environmental threat detection and assessment.

The Center has progressed on several fronts, including: 1) development of a hypertext-based Forest Environmental Threats Encyclopedia, which makes threat assessment information accessible via the Internet, 2) initiation of major cooperative ventures with NASA’s Stennis Space Center and others to use remote sensing for early detection of environmental threats, 3) identification of priority invasive species for detection, prevention, eradication, and control in eastern forests, and 4) collaboration with the Southern Group of State Foresters to examine consequences related to urbanization, fragmentation, and parcelation of Southern forests.

Research ultimately will lead to an understanding of the potential benefits of maintaining or sustaining Southern forests and will help identify policy options for managing change.





Future EFETAC Research

The environmental threats that motivated EFETAC establishment are likely to increase, perhaps exponentially, with time. The Center plans to:
  • Continue to develop early warning systems, looking for evidence of change or stress within larger landscapes, through advanced technologies and analytical capabilities, while working closely with Research and Development partners, such as NASA.
  • Accelerate technology development for data capturing technologies, high-end computing, data analysis, modeling capabilities, and computational infrastructure development.
  • Continue development of user-friendly tools for comparative risk assessment by adaptation of existing protocols or frameworks and through collaborative analyses of specific problems.






Back to: Emerging Issues in the South

PDF Format Available for Download: Threat Assessment Download - 260 KB




Maintaining healthy Southern forests requires an understanding of changing market conditions, rapidly evolving forest threats, and the socio-economic aspects associated with landowner decision making. Incentives and new markets for ecosystem services and biomass are encouraged to support keeping forest lands in working forests, thus preventing fragmentation and loss of habitat. The capacity of States to deliver training, science, and assistance to landowners is essential for success.






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