Five years after Vaia: Forest and land management in mountain environments: experiences and knowledge five years after the Vaia storm

Abstract

The Vaia Storm had a significant impact on forests and on the related sector in North-Eastern Italy, considerably influencing forest management and the wood supply chain. Five years after the event, on October 30th 2023 in the Aula Magna of the Agripolis campus of the University of Padua, young researchers from the TESAF and DAFNAE Departments presented their results from ongoing research on windthrow and related cascade disturbances (e.g. bark beetle outbreaks). In the first part of the day, contributions from the various regions (Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Lombardy, Veneto) and the autonomous provinces (Bolzano/Bozen and Trento) were presented, with an update on the post-event management experiences and problems. In the second part, the projects financed by the University of Padua were presented (VAIAFRONT of TESAF and the “Young Researchers for Vaia” initiative), followed by talks delivered by doctoral students and research fellows who presented the main results relating to the research conducted on the Vaia storm. The problem was addressed from different points of view and with a multidisciplinary approach, analyzing aspects related to silviculture and forest ecology, mechanization and forest uses, entomology, hydrology, geomatics and the socio-economic context. Given the interest of the topics covered, here we report the summary of the contributions presented by the young researchers, with the hope that this will encourage the exchange of knowledge and provide inspiration for further collaborations and in-depth studies.