UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- A Native American tribal nation in Wisconsin faces cultural and economic challenges as climate change impacts its forest home. A $1.7 million grant from the National Science Foundation will study this relationship and how it could inform decision-making about forest management.
Erica Smithwick, associate professor of geography and associate in the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute, Penn State, is the principal investigator on the five-year project, funded from the NSF Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems (CNH) program.
Smithwick will work with an interdisciplinary Penn State team in collaboration with co-principal investigator Christopher Caldwell, director of the Sustainable Development Institute at the College of Menominee Nation. The Penn State team also includes Nancy Tuana, professor of philosophy, Alexander Klippel, associate professor of geography, Rebecca Bird, professor of anthropology, Klaus Keller, professor of geosciences and Robert Nicholas, research associate in EESI.
The project centers around the Menominee Nation, an indigenous people in the Great Lakes region whose remaining ancestral lands contain a contiguous forest that has been managed sustainably for timber harvesting for more than 150 years. The Menominee forest is vital for the cultural and economic identity of the more than 9,000 enrolled tribal members who live on or near the reservation, which is located approximately 45 miles outside of Green Bay, Wisconsin.
"The Menominee are increasingly noticing that there are threats to their forest sustainability practices," Smithwick said. "They are noticing maybe some species aren't doing as well, and some trees are suffering from pests or pathogens. They are wondering how their ability to manage the forest will be impacted if those disturbances become more severe."