Master of Science in Bioscience Engineering: Forest and Nature Management
There is a growing interest in the preservation/conservation of existing forests and natural patrimony, and the acquisition of new nature areas. This tendency requires a growing expertise in sustainable management of natural areas. Our study programme aims at training academic engineers who are able to contribute to the sustainable use and integrated forest and nature management.
What
Safeguarding biodiverse and well-functioning terrestrial ecosystems is of essential importance. In addition to being a habitat to complex biocoenoses, our ecosystems also supply valuable products and services to humankind and society. Our fast-changing world, however, puts these ecosystems and their natural capital under severe pressure. It is therefore with good reason that environmental care has been defined in the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) as one of three leading dimensions for a sustainable future. Protection, restoration and futureproof management of forests, nature areas and the landscape they constitute take centre stage. Although ecosystems suffer from environmental changes, they can at the same time also offer important natural solutions to these changes. Climate mitigation and adaptation strategies can have welcome by-products, as is the case, for instance, with biodiversity conservation and the strengthening of forests and nature areas. Indeed, this specific example has recently been embedded in the European Green Deal. It goes without saying that this and other complex issues call for solid expert knowledge. Our Master’s programme delivers widely employable professionals in the broad field of forest and nature management. We introduce new technologies to map an ecosystem’s complex structures and functioning, ranging from individual growth rings to large-scale vegetation patterns in landscapes. To this end, we teach you to combine laboratory imaging, laser scanning in the field and sensors on planes and satellites with spatial analysis techniques. Equipped with this toolbox, you are able to study and understand the ecological impact of complex environmental changes such as repurposed land use and climate change. In so doing, we focus on the productivity, biodiversity and functioning of forests and nature areas, among other things. Furthermore, you learn how vegetation models allow for making predictions and calculating scenarios for the future. Finally, we teach you to translate your acquired knowledge and insights into substantiated solutions to complex management and policy issues. Specific themes, for instance, are sustainable forest management, wood quality assessment and development of innovative wood treatments, ecological restoration of degraded ecosystems, post-disaster risk management through climate adaptation, and estimation of carbon storage in vegetation.
For whom
The admission requirements vary. Depending on your prior education, you are either able to enrol directly, or there are additional requirements.
Structure
By means of three thematic clusters, this study programme primarily focuses on a deepening knowledge of and insight into sustainable forest, nature and landscape management: nature management, forest management, and wood production and processing. Each of the clusters has a logical and coherent structure and builds on the Bachelor’s programme. Fundamental to our curriculum are course units such as Forestry, Nature Conservation, and Wood Anatomy and Identification of Wood Species. They allow us to fathom the way in which biological systems function, and how they react to environmental change and/or management.
In addition to a specific deepening knowledge of the themes described above, forest and nature management requires an integrated perspective. Several inventory techniques, policy and planning processes and ecological models cannot be reduced to one specific and delineated domain. Course units dealing with these aspects have a broad approach and span the programme’s three thematic clusters. Take, for example, carbon storage potential, which can be estimated by making an inventory of the vegetation present in forests and natural areas and calculating their primary production. Scaling up to landscapes and involving modelling and management planning elements, and wood use, leads to an integration of several different aspects.
Finally, we teach you to translate your acquired knowledge and insights into substantiated solutions to complex management and policy issues, including the necessary communicative skills. In the context of integrated practicals on eco-system management we build on experience-oriented work through national and international excursions, and field work on specific projects and cases. Based on measurement data and other information sources, you learn to elaborate and communicate substantiated management and restoration measures in a policy context, among other things.
The Faculty of Bioscience Engineering is highly international. As such it is a hub for coming into contact with students and cultures from all over the world. During the programme, we visit interesting areas outside of Belgium during the Integrated Practicum. Additionally, there are several ways to gain experience abroad: you can e.g. participate in an exchange programme during the Master’s programme. Naturally, a work placement abroad is also one of the possibilities. In addition, you can go abroad for a period of time as part of your Master’s dissertation. For programme-specific information, please visit www.ugent.be/bw/nl/voor-studenten/buitenland (Dutch only).
Labour Market
Our study programme’s application possibilities and our graduates’ professional profiles are situated in academic research, industrial positions, in consultancy agencies, non-governmental organizations and government agencies. International career opportunities in the (sub-)tropics are possible via closely related international organizations and non-governmental organizations.
Find out where our graduates work (Dutch only) and take a look at our alumni’s highly diverse profiles, such as Product Development and Innovation Manager at Unilin, International Programme Manager at WWF, Project Manager and Regional Coordinator at Prospect, Forest Group Coordinator, CEO at Sylva Arboriculture, Project Officer at BOS+ and Natuurpunt, Project Leader Wood Finishing at WOOD.BE, Academic Director at Avia-GIS, Academic Staff at the Royal Museum for Central Africa, Project Realization Manager at Vlaamse Landmaatschappij or Policy Officer at the City of Ghent’s Gardening Department.
Quality Assurance
At Ghent University, we strive to educate people who dare to think about the challenges of tomorrow. For that purpose, we provide education that is embedded in six strategic objectives: Think Broadly, Keep Researching, Cultivate Talent, Contribute, Extend Horizons, Opt for Quality.
Ghent University continuously focuses on quality assurance and quality culture. The Ghent University's quality assurance system offers information on each study programme’s unique selling points, and on its strengths and weaknesses with regard to quality assurance.
More information:
Unique Selling Points
- Multiperspectivism: our study programme explicitly aims to combine broad academic knowledge in the various domains of forest and nature management, and engineering skills and attitudes. The programme's objective is to ensure that graduates can function on a high level within a Flemish, Belgian, and international environment. This academic training, which combines management and policy, can also be useful to apply in (sub-)tropic countries, which have an increasing need for reliable management of (semi-)natural ecosystems in function of more sustainable human behaviour.
- Talent development: our study programme aims for engineers who work solution-orientated and make decisions based on technical-scientific information. Solution-orientated working is an additional unique selling point of our study programme compared to the related ‘life sciences’ study programmes. By making an appeal to what they acquired during the differentiated study programme, graduates are able to take on responsible functions.
- Knowledge creation: our study programme uses the Ghent University ‘Creative knowledge development' educational concept, which aims to train students to be creative knowledge workers. The programme is supported by three research groups that mainly focus on the various themes the Master's programme contains. Furthermore, these groups have a large international network, which enables supervision of international educational developments in the sector.
- Curriculum: our study programme is balanced and includes a wide range of seminars as well as national and (non-mandatory) international excursions. The programme is unique in Flanders and difficult to compare to international study programmes, because similar programmes that combine life sciences and engineering are not common.
- Integration of theory and practice: our teaching activities mainly take place at the Ghent University campus Coupure (in Ghent). Furthermore, our study programme has the experimental forest Aelmoeseneiebos at its disposal, as well as an experimental set-up (marteloscope) at the provincial domain ‘Het Leen’.
Strengths
- Motivated team of lecturers: our programme and the teaching staff’s expert knowledge enable focus on both the temperate zones and the tropics. The lecturers from the different research groups have strong international networks and frequently invite guest speakers to provide seminars.
- Room for practical experience: apart from the general education facilities, lecturers and students are also able to use a number of specific locations, namely: (1) the ‘outdoor classroom’ Aelmoeseneiebos (Dutch only): the 30 ha sized Ghent University experimental forest including its arboretum, in which, among others, the lectures and exercises for the Forestry, and Inventory of Forest and Nature course units are taught; (2) a xylotheque at campus Coupure, where students can be introduced to the most important types of wood; (3) a marteloscope (i.e. a carefully measured forest stand in which advanced thinning exercises can be done) that was set up by the Forest & Nature Lab at the provincial domain ‘Het Leen’ in Eeklo, and (4) an own PC classroom, in which, among others, exercises for the Inventory of Forest and Nature, and Forest and Nature Management Planning course units are taught.
- Assessment: all competencies are not only aimed at, but also assessed multiple times. Currently, a major part of the assessment policy is already being put into practice. The study programme uses a variety of methods to assess programme-specific competencies. The study programme is assessed positively by the students, and the majority of the students obtain the Master's degree within 2 years.
- Approachability: our study programme boasts a relatively large teaching staff, which enables a very direct way of interaction with the students. This also provides opportunities to use interactive forms of education and to supply good feedback.
Challenges
- Optimizing student workload: various course units contain extra projects (such as presentations, papers), that are marked as part of the assessment. The student workload should be further optimized. Our study programme continues to monitor the various projects, enabling adjustment between the different course units (timing, expected competencies), as well as to the scientific communication learning pathway. This workload schedule is also sent to our students.
- Expanding integrated approach: integrated practicals combine contents of various preceding course units from an experience-based working perspective. This approach will be further expanded in the future for Nature management, by analogy with the existing Integrated Forest Management Practicum.
- Strengthening the connection with the professional field: the contact with the programme-specific professional field is being enhanced. On the one hand, the professional field is invited to assess the study programme from their own experience and expert knowledge, and on the other hand, the students are being informed on the possibilities in the professional field by means of updated career paths of alumni who are active in the professional field. Based on this input, attention is paid to the elective course units and their scheduling.
This study programme is accredited by the Accreditation Organization of the Netherlands and Flanders (Dutch: NVAO). Accreditation was extended following the positive outcome of the institutional review in 2022. Programme quality was validated by a quality review, i.e. a screening of the Education Monitor by the Education Quality Board. The Quality Assurance Resolution (in Dutch) can be found here.
This information was last updated on 01/02/2023.
In case of questions or suggestions with regard to the publicly available information, please contact the study programme.