A digital map of the world's forests provides a uniform basis for global conservation analysis. The World Conservation Monitoring Centre subdivided this forest coverage into broad forest types and overlaid ecological zones to define ecological variants. This work builds upon a prior 1997 study by Iremonger et al.
Use Cases
- Assessing representativeness of protected areas by overlaying forest type and ecological zone layers.
- Identifying priority conservation areas by analyzing the extent of current forest cover within each ecological zone.
- Modeling forest protection status globally using a uniform classification of broad forest types.
- Analyzing the distribution of ecological variants by intersecting forest type polygons with ecological zone coverages.
Strengths
- Provides a globally uniform digital forest map, addressing prior methodological disparities between regions.
- Enables detailed analysis by subdividing global forest cover into broad types and ecological variants.
Limitations
- Data temporal coverage is based on studies from the mid-1990s, likely representing historical snapshots.
- The original forest coverage was not subdivided by type, requiring overlay with ecological zones as a surrogate.
Provenance
- Source
- World Conservation Monitoring Centre (WCMC)
- Collection Method
- Digital map creation and analysis using overlay of forest coverage with ecological zones classifications.
- Time Range
- null
- Freshness
- null
- Geography
- Global