Sociocultural Forest Monitoring (WaMos3)

WaMos3 is the third assessment of the relationship of the Swiss population to the forest after 1997 and 2010 and was conducted in 2020. As in WaMos2 in 2010, the attitude of the population to the forest as a recreation area, to wood production and to the protective and ecological functions were examined. The topic of climate change was also included. In addition, the views of adolescents between 15 and 18 years of age were taken into account for the first time.

The main aims of WaMos3 are:

1. To bring our knowledge concerning the relationship of the population to the forest up to date.
2. Comparison of the population's attitudes between 1997, 2010 and 2020.
3. Revision of previous content
4. Political analysis of the results

The work was carried out by a consortium of researchers from WSL, HSR, HEPIA & UNIL. WSL's task in the main module was to update the 2010 survey and develop it further, in order to conduct a representative online-panel survey. The WaMos3 main survey also involved 10 cantons with corresponding oversamplings (i.e. representative samples of the respective cantons in addition to the representative overall sample), so that statistically valid statements can be made at the cantonal level. Parallel to the Swiss survey, a WaMos-survey was carried out in Baden-Württemberg (D) by the FVA in Freiburg im Breisgau. This allows an international comparison for some aspects.

As a new feature of WaMos3, forest visitor surveys were carried out by researchers from HSR and HEPIA to enable a comparison between forest visitor surveys and the online-panel survey.

WaMos3-Website of the FOEN