Forests provide ecosystem services, including timber production. In some cases, private forest owners perform management actions in order to enhance the provision of such services, or they may be encouraged by public policies and payments. This paper focuses specifically on the decision to set forest land aside for biodiversity conservation, as part of the more general question of the efficiency of multiple-use vs. specialised management of forest lands. We propose an econometric analysis to identify factors in the set-aside choice and measure the impact of this decision on forest management costs. The results show that the set-aside choice depends on the landowners’ income and motivations related to forest amenities. The choice of specialised management, as reflected in the set-aside decision, has a significant and positive impact on the intensity of management in the remainder of the forest and on management costs. From a policy implications point of view, these results suggest that instruments such as forest certification, subsidies and reverse auctions for conservation will be most likely to attract the interest of those forest owners with personal motivations and forest properties that offer both benefit and cost advantages in opting for such specialised management strategies.

森林提供生态系统服务，包括木材生产。在某些情况下，私人森林所有者采取管理行动以加强此类服务的提供，或者他们可能受到公共政策和付款的鼓励。本文特别关注为生物多样性保护留出林地的决定，作为更普遍的问题的一部分，即多用途与专门管理林地的效率。我们建议进行计量经济学分析，以确定预留选择中的因素，并衡量该决定对森林管理成本的影响。结果表明，预留选择取决于土地所有者的收入和与森林设施相关的动机。专业化管理的选择，反映在预留决定中，对剩余森林的管理强度和管理成本产生重大而积极的影响。从政策含义的角度来看，这些结果表明，森林认证、补贴和保护反向拍卖等手段最有可能吸引那些有个人动机的森林所有者的兴趣和森林财产，在选择这种专门的管理策略。