Family Forest Landowners’ Preferences for Meeting Format and Outreach with Forest Professionals Post-COVID-19

Abstract

Outreach to family forest landowners promotes sustainable forest management activities but shifting demographics may challenge the usefulness of conventional outreach approaches. COVID-19 also changed communication patterns, with unprecedented adoption of video conferencing (e.g., Zoom), creating a potential alternative for forestry professionals. We surveyed Arkansas and Louisiana family forest landowners using online and mail response options to understand their preferred meeting mode for participating in forestry outreach, ranging from in-person to online meetings, as well as their prior forest information sources and topics. Our findings show that over a third of landowners increased the use of video calls during COVID-19 and that two-thirds of landowners either prefer online meetings or are indifferent between online versus in-person meetings. Factors conducive of “in-person or online” and “online only” meetings include distance to forestland, increased video calling and past e-mail and social media use frequency, online survey response, individual ownership, past reforestation, and recreation objective. Online survey respondents represent a demographically different segment of forest landowners. Online methods will become increasingly attractive as a new generation of landowners takes over for forest management who have greater familiarity and use of online communication methods.