Degradation of forest ecosystems in the Left-Bank Forest-Steppe of Ukraine and impact on agricultural landscapes: DPSIR approach
Abstract
Purpose. An analytical synthesis of degradation processes in forest ecosystems of the Left-Bank Forest-Steppe of Ukraine and examines their relationship with the ecological condition of adjacent agricultural landscapes using the DPSIR framework.
Methods. The DPSIR approach (EEA, 1999) was used as a conceptual framework to structure cause-and-effect relationships; methods of systematization and generalization of biotic pressure factors based on forest pathology survey data were applied, along with a comparative analysis of scientific sources.
Results. The empirical basis comprises data from surveys of more than 5,000 common ash trees (Fraxinus excelsior L.), conducted over multiple years (mainly in the 2010s) across 52 permanent and 125 temporary sample plots in stands of seven forest enterprises. Methodological approaches to forest pathology monitoring in the plain regions of Ukraine were used to substantiate management measures. The main biotic pressure factors were systematized, including stem pests, defoliating insects, pathogenic fungi, and bacterial diseases, whose interaction is characterized as complex (synergistic). A causal chain P → S → I was identified. The decline in erosion-control and water-regulating functions of degraded forest ecosystems is consistent with the deterioration of soil properties and a decrease in soil fertility; the intensification of erosion processes in adjacent agricultural landscapes is consistent with findings reported in the scientific literature.
Conclusions. The sanitary condition of ash stands is regarded as an integral indicator of forest ecosystem degradation and an early marker of environmental risks for agricultural landscapes. The scientific novelty lies in the formalization of cause-and-effect relationships between biotic factors of ash stand degradation and ecological changes in adjacent agricultural landscapes within the DPSIR framework, as well as in the use of the sanitary condition of stands as an integral indicator of these processes.
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