Strategies for sustainable management of Hyrcanian forests, resulting from the logging ban, using TOPSIS and Shannon's entropy

After the logging ban for Hyrcanian forests, it is necessary to investigate its consequences. The purpose of this research is to identify the appropriate strategies resulting from the logging ban for future forestry plans. First, the positive and negative consequences were adjusted according to the origin of the effect in the form of internal and external SWOT factors. After screening items with acceptable validity and reliability, from the conflict of internal and external factors, four SWOT strategies including progressive (SO), competitive diversity (ST), revision (WO), and defensive (WT) strategies were determined. 45 strategies based on sustainable management were evaluated by the TOPSIS technique using a Delphi survey (15 experts) with purposeful sampling and a 7-point Likert scale. The results of Shannon's entropy calculations showed that the Strategy of management structure, local forest communities, ecological and health values, dealing with risks, and other global forest functions have the most weight and influence in the ranking of sustainable management strategies. The results showed that according to the Pareto principle, 34 strategies have 80% importance. Therefore, for sustainable management, a wide range of decisions should be taken in forestry plans. logging ban strategies include the expansion of wood farming, conserving habitats, special trees, ruined parcels, and the outskirts of villages, wood and non-wood exploitation subject to the elimination of forest destruction factors with the participation and increase of the income of traditional users and the design and implementation of forestry plans as Balanced in all forest areas with more restrictions on traditional animal husbandry and interaction conditional on protection and restoration with forest herders and the triple integration of management, environmental and social perspectives in the supervision of forestry plans, promotion of education programs and promotion of natural resources. Basic exploitation by growing young stands, reducing natural hazards, increasing wood cultivation, eliminating hydrological disturbances in the forest road zone, and implementing forestry plans based on sustainability criteria are considered to be the most important solutions for sustainable forest management.