The map showed IFL extent for year 2000 and enabled measuring of forest degradation (understood as a reduction in ecological integrity across a forest landscape) at the global, biome and national levels. The first global IFL map was prepared in 2005-2006 under the leadership of Greenpeace, with contributions from: Biodiversity Conservation Center, International Socio-Ecological Union, and Transparent World (Russia), Luonto Liitto (Finnish Nature League), Forest Watch Indonesia, and Global Forest Watch, a network initiated by the World Resources Institute. according to the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards. The IFL method could be used for fast and cost-effective assessment and monitoring of forest degradation in the context of REDD+ mechanism and for responsible forest management certification process, e.g. Developed by a team of research and environmental organizations ( University of Maryland, Greenpeace, World Resources Institute, and Transparent World), the IFL concept, mapping and monitoring algorithms have been used in forest degradation assessments, forestry certification, conservation policy improvement, and scientific research. The essence of the IFL method is to use freely available medium spatial resolution satellite imagery to establish the boundaries of large undeveloped forest areas, so called Intact Forest Landscapes (IFL), and to use these boundaries as a baseline for forest degradation monitoring. The IFL concept and its technical definition were introduced to help create, implement, and monitor policies concerning the landscapes alteration and fragmentation at the regional-to-global levels. IFLs have high conservation value and are critical for stabilizing terrestrial carbon storage, harboring biodiversity, regulating hydrological regimes, and providing other ecosystem functions. An Intact Forest Landscape (IFL) is a seamless mosaic of forest and naturally treeless ecosystems within the zone of current forest extent, which exhibit no remotely detected signs of human activity or habitat fragmentation and is large enough to maintain all native biological diversity, including viable populations of wide-ranging species.
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