Maintaining carbon in the forest soils of the Morvan (France): spatial and knowledge competition around the evolution of practices

This paper deals with a specific form of carbon-centred rationale aimed at maintaining carbon stocks in forest soils by promoting certain practices and discouraging others, primarily clearcutting. The goal is to explore recategorisations and realignments within the forestry sector brought about as a result of increased awareness of this rationale in the public debate within France. To do this, I conducted a qualitative case study (observations, interviews, and document analysis) in the Morvan region (centre, France), which plays a role in the French national media as a hotspot of opposition between contrasting forestry models. The global issue of maintaining carbon in forest soils is translated into the local context mainly by environmental NGOs and their allies, who redefine older critiques of clearcutting. Knowledge on the topic circulates in three parallel networks of stakeholders in the Morvan, due to a polarised setting where the Regional nature park of the Morvan has difficulty acting as an interface. Beyond the committed decarbonisation agendas of citizen-led forestry groups, a more general loss of legitimacy of clearcutting is tangible within the forestry sector, with some operators favouring other models, such as natural regeneration. Greened forms of clearcutting are also justified with merely strategic uses of carbon arguments. Paradoxically, these various positions about maintaining carbon in forest soils can lead to a similar interest for less productive areas of forest. Another weak signal of the revival of forestry production in the name of carbon is the increasing implementation of the Label bas carbone scheme.