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Report to the Majority Leader, U.S. Senate: 

United States Government Accountability Office: 
GAO: 

October 2010: 

Forest Service Research And Development: 

Improvements in Delivery of Research Results Can Help Ensure That 
Benefits of Research Are Realized: 

GAO-11-12: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-11-12, a report to the Majority Leader, U.S. Senate. 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

In recent decades, managing the nation’s public and private forests 
and rangelands has become increasingly complex, requiring a sound 
understanding of science and science-based tools to address these 
complexities. The Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service maintains 
a research and development program (FS R&D) to help provide scientific 
information and tools. GAO was asked to examine (1) the scope of 
research and development carried out by FS R&D and some of its 
resulting accomplishments, (2) trends in resources used in performing 
FS R&D work and the effects of those trends on its research efforts 
and priorities, and (3) recent steps FS R&D has taken to improve its 
ability to fulfill its mission and challenges it faces in doing so. In 
conducting this review, GAO analyzed FS R&D funding data for fiscal 
years 2000 to 2009 and staffing data for fiscal years 2006 to 2009 and 
interviewed officials from FS R&D, other federal agencies, and 
nonfederal entities. 

What GAO Found: 

The scope of FS R&D’s work spans a range of research organized into 
seven strategic program areas: invasive species; inventory and 
monitoring; outdoor recreation; resource management and use; water, 
air, and soils; wildland fire; and wildlife and fish. Using funds 
appropriated to it, as well as funds from authorized external sources 
such as universities and other federal agencies, FS R&D operates a 
system of research stations, which in turn oversee laboratories, 
experimental forests, and other research locations nationwide. 
According to end users of FS R&D’s work, its accomplishments are many 
and varied, including the Forest Inventory and Analysis program, which 
provides long-term data on the nation’s forests; efforts to identify 
and control invasive pests; and software applications to quantify the 
environmental benefits of urban forests. Nevertheless, end users also 
identified areas requiring additional attention by FS R&D, such as 
social science research to better understand human interaction with 
natural resources. 

Overall, spending by FS R&D-using both its own appropriated funds and 
resources from external sources-—remained relatively flat during 
fiscal years 2000 through 2009, with an average annual increase of 3.2 
percent, or 0.8 percent when adjusted for inflation; funding from 
external sources represented a small but growing portion of the total. 
Trends in spending varied across research stations, with some 
experiencing increases and others decreases. In response to these 
trends, many stations reduced their staffing levels and increasingly 
sought support from external sources. While doing so has had 
advantages, it has changed the way FS R&D carries out its work and 
sets research priorities. For example, because external funding is 
often short term in nature, reliance on this funding may lead FS R&D 
to address more short-term research issues. 

FS R&D has taken steps to improve its ability to fulfill its mission 
in several areas, including increasing its efforts to deliver 
knowledge and tools to end users and involving end users in setting 
research agendas; improving funding allocation processes; and 
increasing coordination with other federal research agencies. Despite 
these efforts, challenges persist, particularly in the area of science 
delivery—-that is, how research results are communicated. While FS R&D 
has created a more formal system for science delivery at multiple 
levels within the agency, and several research stations have specific 
programs dedicated to science delivery, numerous officials and end 
users told GAO that FS R&D places greater emphasis on peer-reviewed 
journals as a means of science delivery than on other types of science 
delivery efforts, such as workshops, that are often more useful to end 
users. According to these officials, the performance assessment system 
for FS R&D researchers often reinforces this bias. Without improved 
delivery of research results, land managers and others may be unable 
to fully benefit from the agency’s work. FS R&D officials also 
reported several challenges that impede their ability to conduct their 
day-to-day research, including computing and information technology, 
human capital, and other administrative issues. 

What GAO Recommends: 

GAO recommends that the Forest Service assess the effectiveness of 
recent steps FS R&D has taken to improve science delivery and take 
steps to ensure that individual performance assessments better balance 
the various types of science delivery activities. In commenting on a 
draft of this report, the Forest Service agreed with GAO’s findings 
and recommendations. 

View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-12] or key 
components. For more information, contact Anu Mittal at (202) 512-3841 
or mittala@gao.gov. 

[End of section] 

Contents: 

Letter: 

Background: 

FS R&D's Work Encompasses a Wide Range of Research Activities and Has 
Resulted in Numerous Achievements over Time: 

Over the Last Decade, Spending by FS R&D Remained Relatively Flat, 
Affecting Its Hiring Patterns and Research Activities: 

FS R&D Has Recently Taken a Number of Steps to Improve Its Ability to 
Fulfill Its Mission, but Challenges Remain, Particularly in Science 
Delivery: 

Conclusions: 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology: 

Appendix II: FS R&D Research Stations: 

Appendix III: Forest Service Research and Development Spending and 
Personnel Data, by Research Station: 

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Agriculture, Forest 
Service: 

Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

Tables: 

Table 1: Number of Permanent FS R&D Employees, by Employment Type, 
Fiscal Years 2006 through 2009: 

Table 2: Spending Using Forest Service Appropriations by Research 
Station, Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

Table 3: FS R&D Spending Using External Sources by Research Station, 
Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

Table 4: Number of Projects Supported by, and Amount of, External 
Funding Provided to FS R&D, by Funding Source, Fiscal Years 2005 
through 2009: 

Table 5: Number of FS R&D Employees by Research Station, Fiscal Years 
2006 through 2009: 

Figures: 

Figure 1: Geographical Coverage of FS R&D Research Stations: 

Figure 2: Spending Using Forest Service Appropriations, Fiscal Years 
2000 through 2009: 

Figure 3: Average Annual Change in Research Station Spending Using 
Forest Service Appropriations, Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

Figure 4: FS R&D Spending Using External Sources, Fiscal Years 2000 
through 2009: 

Figure 5: FS R&D Sources of External Funding, by Percentage 
Contributed, Fiscal Years 2005 through 2009: 

Figure 6: Northern Research Station: 

Figure 7: Pacific Northwest Research Station: 

Figure 8: Pacific Southwest Research Station: 

Figure 9: Rocky Mountain Research Station: 

Figure 10: Southern Research Station: 

Figure 11: Forest Products Laboratory: 

Figure 12: The International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 

Abbreviations: 

FS R&D: Forest Service Research and Development: 

FIA: Forest Inventory and Analysis: 

USGS: U.S. Geological Survey: 

[End of section] 

United States Government Accountability Office:
Washington, DC 20548: 

October 29, 2010: 

The Honorable Harry Reid:
Majority Leader:
United States Senate: 

Dear Senator Reid: 

As our nation's population has expanded, demands on public and private 
forests and rangelands for production, recreation, and other uses have 
also intensified. At the same time, managing these lands has become 
more complex as multiple stresses--including insect and disease 
outbreaks, climate change, and intense wildland fires--alter forest 
structures and affect forest uses. Managing forest resources in the 
face of these demands and stresses highlights the importance of a 
sound understanding of the science underlying these phenomena and the 
need for science-based tools for addressing problems. The Department 
of Agriculture's Forest Service is the land management agency 
responsible for sustaining the health, diversity, and productivity of 
the nation's forests and grasslands to meet the needs of present and 
future generations. The Forest Service maintains a research and 
development program that helps the agency and a broad range of other 
constituents manage these challenges by providing science as a 
foundation for stewardship decisions. 

Forest Service Research and Development (FS R&D)--one of three main 
Forest Service programs--has as its mission to develop and deliver 
knowledge and innovative technology to improve the health and use of 
the nation's forests and rangelands, both public and private.[Footnote 
1] In fulfilling this mission, FS R&D conducts basic research in a 
range of biological, physical, and social science fields and applies 
this knowledge to develop technologies and deliver science to federal 
and state land managers, industry, private landowners, and other 
entities. The dissemination of knowledge and innovative technologies-- 
the second half of FS R&D's mission--is often referred to by FS R&D 
staff as science delivery. FS R&D receives funds appropriated to it as 
well as funds from other authorized external sources, including 
universities and other federal agencies. 

To gain a better understanding of FS R&D, you asked us to review the 
program, including its mission and structure, its research areas and 
resulting accomplishments, and its process for setting priorities. 
Accordingly, this report examines (1) the scope of research and 
development carried out by FS R&D and some of its resulting 
accomplishments, (2) trends in resources used in performing FS R&D 
work and the effects of those trends on the agency's research efforts 
and priorities, and (3) recent steps FS R&D has taken to improve its 
ability to fulfill its mission and the challenges it faces in doing so. 

To do our work, we reviewed relevant laws, regulations, guidance, 
strategic plans, performance reviews, and historical documents and 
interviewed officials in FS R&D headquarters and all seven of the 
agency's research stations. We also interviewed National Forest System 
and State and Private Forestry officials in all nine Forest Service 
regions, as well as stakeholders, including representatives from 
industry and other nonfederal groups, such as the National Association 
of University Forest Resources Programs, National Woodland Owners 
Association, and the National Association of State Foresters. We also 
interviewed officials from other federal agencies that conduct 
research similar to that of FS R&D, to determine the extent to which 
FS R&D coordinates its work with these other agencies to avoid 
duplication of research. We obtained and analyzed spending data for 
fiscal years 2000 through 2009 on funds appropriated for FS R&D and 
funds from other authorized sources,[Footnote 2] as well as staffing 
data for fiscal years 2006 through 2009,[Footnote 3] for the program 
as a whole and at individual research stations. We analyzed the data 
in both nominal (actual) and real terms (adjusted for inflation). 
[Footnote 4] We assessed the reliability of funding and staffing data 
by reviewing the methods of data collection for relevant databases and 
determined that the data were sufficiently reliable for the purposes 
of this report. A more detailed description of our scope and 
methodology appears in appendix I. 

We conducted this performance audit from October 2009 through October 
2010, in accordance with generally accepted government auditing 
standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit 
to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable 
basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 
We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for 
our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Background: 

Research has been a part of the Forest Service's mission since the 
agency's creation in 1905, and several Forest Service research 
facilities date back to the early 1900s. FS R&D's research and 
development activities take place within seven research stations (see 
figure 1). Five of the seven are focused regionally, with each 
covering a multistate region; these are the Pacific Northwest, Pacific 
Southwest, Rocky Mountain, Northern, and Southern research stations. 
In contrast, the remaining two stations--the Forest Products 
Laboratory and the International Institute of Tropical Forestry 
[Footnote 5]--are not regionally focused but, rather, concentrate on 
specific research topics.[Footnote 6] The stations are decentralized, 
with the director of each station reporting directly to the Chief of 
the Forest Service. 

Figure 1: Geographical Coverage of FS R&D Research Stations: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map] 

Map of the United States, indicating the following geographical 
coverage of FS R&D Research Stations: 

Northern Research Station (includes Forest Products Laboratory); 
Southern Research Station; 
Rocky Mountain Research Station; 
Pacific Northwest Research Station; 
Pacific Southwest Research Station; 
International Institute of Tropical Forestry. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

According to FS R&D officials, the geographic alignment of these 
stations helps foster understanding of, and focus research attention 
on, issues of local or regional significance. For example, large urban 
concentrations in the area covered by the Northern Research Station 
make urban forestry and social science a research priority. Within 
each of the five geographically based research stations, multiple 
laboratories carry out specific research activities. In addition, FS 
R&D maintains 81 experimental forests and ranges across the nation, 
which serve as sites for most of the agency's long-term research. 
These sites--which range in size from about 115 acres to over 55,000 
acres--represent most of the nation's major forest ecosystems. With 
some sites dating back to the early 1900s, they have allowed FS R&D to 
compile long-term data about how forests respond to changes in land 
use, climate, and various natural and human-caused disturbances. FS 
R&D's work is carried out by research scientists, technicians, and 
other professionals, using techniques from a diverse set of 
disciplines. 

The mission of FS R&D is multifaceted. In developing and delivering 
knowledge and innovative technology, the agency is responsible both 
for long-term, basic research to increase scientific knowledge and for 
applied research and science delivery as a means of disseminating that 
knowledge to potential end users. In addition, FS R&D's mission 
includes the nation's forests and rangelands, both public and private. 
While much of FS R&D's role is to support the Forest Service in 
managing national forests, its research and science delivery 
activities are also to include issues related to forests and ranges on 
other federal lands, as well as nonfederal lands managed by states or 
private landowners. 

In addition to funds appropriated to the Forest Service by Congress, 
FS R&D uses funds provided by external sources to conduct research and 
development and often collaborates with external entities in carrying 
out its work. FS R&D is authorized to do so by the Forest and 
Rangeland Renewable Resources Research Act of 1978[Footnote 7]--the 
primary legislation authorizing FS R&D's activities--which states 
that, in implementing the act, FS R&D may cooperate with federal, 
state, and other governmental agencies; with public or private 
agencies, institutions, universities, and organizations; and with 
businesses and individuals in the United States and in other 
countries. The act allows the Secretary of Agriculture to receive 
money and other contributions from cooperators under such conditions 
as the Secretary may prescribe. 

In addition to FS R&D, a number of other agencies focus on natural 
resource issues and may therefore also conduct research on forest 
issues. These agencies include, among others, the U.S. Geological 
Survey (USGS) within the Department of the Interior, the National 
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration within the Department of 
Commerce, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Other agencies may 
also conduct forest-related research although their main focus is not 
on natural resource issues. For example, the National Aeronautics and 
Space Administration maintains an Earth science program intended to, 
among other aims, improve the prediction of climate, weather, and 
natural hazards including wildland fire. 

FS R&D's Work Encompasses a Wide Range of Research Activities and Has 
Resulted in Numerous Achievements over Time: 

The scope of FS R&D's work spans a range of research activities 
related to forests and rangelands, from collecting basic data on 
forest species to studying societal values in relation to land use. 
Agency officials and other stakeholders we spoke with attested to FS 
R&D's accomplishments over time, which run the gamut from basic data 
about the condition of the nation's forests to research and tools 
useful in managing wildland fire and invasive species, and also noted 
areas that could benefit from additional research. 

FS R&D's Work Covers Multiple Research Areas, Both National and 
Regional in Scope: 

FS R&D's research addresses national and regional priorities, as well 
as areas of international concern. FS R&D disseminates the results of 
its research in many ways, including publication in peer-reviewed 
journals and other technical and general publications, creation of 
computer-based modeling tools, and workshops and other outreach 
activities. Through its funding allocation process, as well as central 
reviews of the stations' research agendas, FS R&D headquarters seeks 
to ensure that research activities are consistent with the agency's 
overall goals. 

Research Areas and Locations: 

FS R&D's national and regional research aims have evolved over time to 
mirror shifts in the mission of the Forest Service as a whole. In the 
years after World War II, for example, the amount of timber harvested 
from national forests increased dramatically, and much of FS R&D's 
work focused on supporting management of the nation's forests for wood 
production and on the use of forest products. More recently, the 
Forest Service has emphasized maintaining and restoring land health, 
and, according to agency officials, FS R&D's emphasis has likewise 
shifted toward the functioning of whole ecosystems, including air and 
water quality, biological diversity, and climate change. This widening 
of research focus, according to FS R&D officials, encourages 
scientists and managers to work together across land ownership 
boundaries and support a landscape-scale approach to land management, 
which includes an increased emphasis on urban forestry. FS R&D also 
conducts research in emerging areas such as climate change and 
nanotechnology.[Footnote 8] 

FS R&D's strategic plan provides goals to help the agency set 
priorities for its various research efforts and identify future 
program direction; this plan is linked to broader strategic plans both 
at the Forest Service and department level, as well as to plans 
developed by the research stations. According to agency planning 
documents, FS R&D has organized its research into the following seven 
"strategic program areas:" 

* Invasive Species provides scientific information, methods, and 
technology to reduce, minimize, or eliminate the introduction, 
establishment, spread, and impact of invasive species and to restore 
ecosystems affected by these species. 

* Inventory and Monitoring provides resource data, analysis, and tools 
for identifying current status and trends of forests; management 
options and impacts, including modeling of forest conditions under 
various management scenarios; and threats from fire, insects, disease, 
and other natural processes. 

* Outdoor Recreation develops knowledge and tools to support informed 
recreation and wilderness management decisions that improve outdoor 
recreation opportunities for current and future generations while 
sustaining healthy ecosystems. 

* Resource Management and Use provides a scientific and technological 
base to sustainably manage and use forest resources and forest fiber-
based products. 

* Water, Air and Soils informs the sustainable management of these 
resources through information on how to provide clean air and drinking 
water, protect lives and property from wildfire and smoke, and improve 
the ability to adapt to climate variability and change. 

* Wildland Fire provides knowledge and tools to help reduce the 
negative impacts, and enhance the beneficial effects, of wildland fire 
on society and the environment. 

* Wildlife and Fish informs policy initiatives affecting wildlife and 
fish habitat on private and public lands and the recovery of 
threatened or endangered species. 

According to the agency, categorizing its research activities into 
these program areas has helped FS R&D report its accomplishments; plan 
research investments; organize areas of research for external peer 
review; improve agency accountability; and offer researchers more 
opportunity for interaction along broader, interdisciplinary topics. 

According to agency officials, there are also five "emerging research 
areas" which cut across the seven strategic program areas and help the 
agency set research priorities. These emerging areas are (1) biomass 
and bioenergy, (2) climate change, (3) urban natural resources 
stewardship, (4) watershed management and restoration, and (5) 
nanotechnology. In addition to these emerging areas, the agency 
considers two long-standing programs to be "foundations" underpinning 
much of its research activities: the Forest Inventory and Analysis 
(FIA) program, a periodic census of the nation's forest lands, and the 
network of 81 experimental forests and ranges the agency maintains. 

FS R&D uses the strategic program areas to categorize its research 
nationwide, with each of the seven research stations also having a 
specific set of research programs based on regional priorities. For 
example, the Rocky Mountain Research Station has organized its work 
largely to reflect ecosystems and environments, with research areas 
covering forest and woodland ecosystems; grassland, shrubland, and 
desert ecosystems; wildlife and terrestrial ecosystems; and air, 
water, and aquatic environments. Station officials told us that 
organizing its research in this way reflects the interdisciplinary 
nature of the station's research. In contrast, the Southern Research 
Station has several research areas devoted to issues of regional 
interest in the South, including southern pine ecology; insects, 
diseases, and invasive plants of southern forests; and restoring 
longleaf pine ecosystems. Appendix II lists the research programs and 
locations of all seven research stations. 

According to FS R&D officials, research itself is generally carried 
out at individual laboratories maintained by the research stations, 
with the laboratories often focusing on specific research topics in a 
variety of settings. For example, among the Pacific Southwest Research 
Station's laboratories are the Forest Fire Laboratory in southern 
California, which focuses on fire science, air quality, and 
recreation, and the Institute of Pacific Islands Forestry in Hawaii, 
which focuses on preserving and restoring ecosystems throughout the 
Pacific islands. Likewise the Rocky Mountain Research Station conducts 
its research into grassland, shrubland, and desert ecosystems in 
laboratories located in diverse areas including Moscow, Idaho; Reno, 
Nevada; and Albuquerque, New Mexico. According to FS R&D officials and 
scientists, research carried out by the stations is often of broad 
interest. For example, the Southern Research Station's Forest 
Operations unit in Auburn, Alabama, conducts research on harvesting 
timber and other forest products, and all five geographically based 
research stations study wildland fire. Similarly, the two topically 
oriented research stations, the Forest Products Laboratory and the 
International Institute of Tropical Forestry, conduct research whose 
subject matter is of national or international interest not limited to 
any geographic area. For example, the Forest Products Laboratory 
studies wood preservatives, wood products such as plywood, techniques 
for using woody biomass, and other topics of nationwide interest, 
while the International Institute of Tropical Forestry examines 
issues, such as restoration of degraded tropical forests, of 
international interest. 

Although some research is carried out solely by FS R&D researchers, it 
is also often done in collaboration with other entities, such as 
universities, nongovernmental organizations, or other federal research 
agencies. FS R&D officials and others we spoke with told us that such 
partnerships are valuable for several reasons. First, the partnerships 
are essential for FS R&D to carry out the full scope of its work 
because they allow the agency to take advantage of scientific 
expertise and facilities that it does not maintain on its own and that 
would be costly and potentially duplicative to develop. Second, by 
promoting interest and expertise outside FS R&D in certain issues, 
such relationships can stimulate partners to carry out additional 
research without FS R&D involvement--especially when additional 
research on a particular topic is needed but the agency does not have 
the resources necessary to continue. Finally, by working with other 
research entities and land management agencies, FS R&D can broaden the 
scope of its research to include a landscape-scale approach to land 
management issues. For example, the Tahoe Science Consortium was 
formed to promote science to help preserve, restore, and enhance the 
Lake Tahoe Basin in California and Nevada. It involves multiple 
research entities, including FS R&D, USGS, and the University of 
Nevada, Reno; land management agencies such as the Forest Service and 
the Department of the Interior; the state of Nevada; and others. 

Science Delivery Activities: 

To disseminate the results of its work, FS R&D engages in multiple 
science delivery activities, including publishing its work both in 
peer-reviewed journals and in less technical media, such as handbooks, 
research station newsletters, and Web sites. For example, FS R&D 
operates an online tool known as Treesearch, which allows users, 
including the general public, to identify and obtain FS R&D research 
publications. FS R&D also works directly with land managers, state and 
local government officials, and others to provide information about FS 
R&D's work and how it can be used to help make decisions related to 
land management and policy. It also develops computer models and other 
tools that can be used in day-to-day land management activities. 
According to agency officials, responsibility for science delivery 
varies across FS R&D. Some research stations have a unit dedicated to 
science delivery, such as the Northern Research Station's Northern 
Science, Technology, and Applied Results program, or NorthSTAR, while 
others do not. Regardless, individual researchers are still expected 
to take responsibility for some science delivery activities related to 
their research. 

Managing FS R&D's Research Activities: 

The decentralized nature of the research stations, as well as the 
variety of work they conduct, increases the importance of central 
oversight of agency research to help ensure that research activities 
conducted at the stations align with the priorities of the agency as a 
whole. FS R&D officials told us they align research pursued at each 
research station with the agency's overall research agenda by 
requiring each of the station's research areas--generally known as 
research programs or research work units--to have a charter or 
research work unit description laying out its research plans and 
objectives. These charters and descriptions are centrally reviewed by 
FS R&D program officials to ensure consistency with the agency's 
research agenda. FS R&D officials also use the funding allocation 
process to ensure that priority research areas are addressed. FS R&D 
headquarters officials told us the agency has the flexibility to 
allocate funding among research stations and programs in response to 
changing and emerging needs because FS R&D's funding comes to the 
agency primarily through a single appropriation account, Forest and 
Rangeland Research, in contrast to the multiple accounts that were 
used in the past.[Footnote 9] In allocating funds to the research 
stations, the Forest Service's Research Executive Team--consisting of 
the FS R&D Deputy Chief, station directors, and Washington office 
program directors--considers the priorities and goals outlined in the 
agency's strategic plans as well as priorities identified by 
individual scientists and the research stations, making it both a top-
down and a bottom-up process, according to one executive team 
official. By balancing emphasis on emerging needs at the national and 
regional levels with research needs identified by scientists in the 
field, this official explained, FS R&D remains nimble enough to 
respond to emerging issues while maintaining basic, long-term research. 

Agency officials also told us that although FS R&D generally seeks to 
maintain year-to-year stability in its research and personnel, no FS 
R&D program or project is entitled to its previous year's budget. In 
addition, while FS R&D headquarters allocates most funding directly to 
the research stations, it retains a small portion of funding to award 
the stations through a competitive process, under which stations 
compete for FS R&D funds to study current topics such as climate 
change. While these funds represent a small fraction of the stations' 
overall budgets, the process encourages stations to prepare research 
proposals that demonstrate the extent to which their research agendas 
align with FS R&D's overall research objectives. One research station 
director, for example, commented that forcing stations to compete for 
research dollars prevents the stations from simply continuing past 
funding and research practices and "doing the same thing we've done 
for 30 years." 

Stakeholders Identified Many and Varied FS R&D Accomplishments but 
Also Areas That Could Benefit from Additional Research: 

According to stakeholders we spoke with, including federal and state 
land managers, university researchers, and others, FS R&D's 
accomplishments have been many and varied, and include efforts in both 
basic and applied research.[Footnote 10] Many of these same 
accomplishments were also identified by agency researchers and 
officials as being significant for FS R&D. Among the most frequently 
identified FS R&D accomplishments was the FIA program, as well as FS 
R&D's work related to wildland fire, invasive species, and vegetation 
management. More broadly, many stakeholders cited FS R&D's overall 
scientific credibility as a significant asset. Nevertheless, several 
stakeholders identified areas that, in their opinion, required greater 
attention by FS R&D. 

Accomplishments: 

* Forest Inventory and Analysis program. One of the accomplishments 
most frequently identified was the FIA program, which has provided 
decades of data used to assess the status, trends, and sustainability 
of America's forests. To date, FIA data collection has been initiated 
for each state, most recently for Hawaii, Nevada, and Wyoming. 
[Footnote 11] According to several stakeholders, these data have been 
fundamental to understanding the nature and changing condition of 
forest resources, which in turn has helped federal, state, and local 
governments, as well as others, make informed decisions about land use 
and management. A few stakeholders added that FIA data have been 
improving and are more useful today than in the recent past because 
they are more comprehensive and include state-specific summaries and 
interpretations, which helps, for example, state foresters better 
communicate the information to public officials, land managers, and 
the public at large. Several stakeholders told us that many state 
foresters relied on FIA data to prepare reports for State-Wide 
Assessments and Strategies for Forest Resources, required by the Food, 
Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008.[Footnote 12] The assessments are 
designed to, among other things, identify the conditions and trends of 
forest resources in the state and threats to those resources. 

* Wildland fire. FS R&D research has also led to a number of 
accomplishments in the area of wildland fire and fuel management, 
according to many stakeholders. Some Forest Service officials in 
National Forest System regional offices noted that FS R&D's research 
has helped them understand the role of fire, fire behavior, and how 
fire can be used as a management tool, including ways to effectively 
reintroduce fire into ecosystems from which it was excluded for many 
years. In addition, FS R&D has developed a number of tools that help 
land managers predict fire's effects on the landscape, such as 
potential paths a wildland fire might take, and thus support better 
decisions on wildland fire response, particularly in communities close 
to forests. FS R&D has also contributed key accomplishments in the 
area of smoke management and air quality. For example, one FS R&D 
official told us that in California, FS R&D work has facilitated 
forecasting the severity of smoke and effects on air quality due to 
wildland fire, allowing the California Air Resources Board to warn the 
public about air quality concerns. 

* Invasive species. Invasive species, including nonnative plants and 
insects, have become one of the most significant environmental threats 
facing the nation's natural resources, costing the public more than 
$138 billion per year in damage, loss, and control costs, according to 
FS R&D estimates. Several stakeholders told us that FS R&D work in 
this area has helped them identify ways to better manage infestations 
and assess potential or actual damage. For example, an exotic beetle 
from Asia called the emerald ash borer has, since its arrival in the 
United States in 2002, killed tens of millions of ash trees in a 
number of eastern and midwestern states and parts of Canada.[Footnote 
13] FS R&D has done research into the beetle's life cycle, methods for 
detecting infestation, and the potential for using native enemies or 
pathogens to control the beetle biologically. Most significantly, 
according to one stakeholder, FS R&D developed a model that users, 
including state foresters, can apply to estimate the efforts and 
funding needed to most effectively attack this beetle. Some 
stakeholders also cited FS R&D's research into the mountain pine 
beetle, a native species that has caused significant tree mortality in 
the West recently, as another important accomplishment. 

* Climate change. FS R&D's climate change research is crucial in 
helping land managers plan for managing natural resources in the 
future, according to several stakeholders, who told us that because 
potential effects of climate change are complex and riddled with 
uncertainty, land managers are increasingly relying on researchers for 
new information and tools. One such tool cited by a stakeholder is the 
Template for Assessing Climate Change Impact and Management Options, a 
Web-based tool produced in part by FS R&D and intended to help land 
managers and planners integrate climate change science into land 
management planning. 

* Vegetation management. Several different types of accomplishments 
related to vegetation management and restoration were cited by 
stakeholders as important accomplishments. For example, scientists 
from the Southern Research Station, along with their research 
partners, have been contributing to restoration of the American 
chestnut.[Footnote 14] According to the American Chestnut Foundation 
and others, the American chestnut was one of the most important trees 
in the eastern United States, once occupying about 25 percent of the 
hardwood canopy in eastern forests, but was virtually eliminated by a 
nonnative fungus called chestnut blight. FS R&D is contributing to the 
restoration effort by planting and monitoring plots of blight-
resistant American chestnut seedlings. 

* Urban forestry. FS R&D's efforts in urban forestry, including 
research on maintaining working forests within urbanizing landscapes 
and educating the public about the value of public and private 
forested lands to residents' quality of life, were also cited by some 
stakeholders as a major accomplishment of FS R&D. Among other efforts, 
FS R&D contributed to the development of a software application called 
i-Tree, which, according to the agency, can help urban communities 
quantify the benefits provided by community trees in mitigating 
pollution, managing storm water runoff, and other benefits and can be 
used to put a dollar value on street trees' annual environmental and 
aesthetic benefits. 

* Scientific credibility. Beyond specific accomplishments, many 
stakeholders cited FS R&D's overall scientific credibility as a 
significant asset to the agency. Regardless of the topic, according to 
these stakeholders, FS R&D's work--which often rests on decades of 
research conducted by multiple scientists--is widely viewed as 
unbiased and scientifically rigorous, which lends weight to land 
management decisions based on that work. Several stakeholders in the 
Forest Service's National Forest System, for example, told us that FS 
R&D research was often useful in developing and defending complex or 
controversial agency land management decisions because it was 
generally viewed as being scientifically sound. Another stakeholder 
pointed out that 13 FS R&D scientists served on the Nobel Prize-
winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a mark of those 
scientists' proficiency in their fields. 

Areas of Research Requiring Greater Attention: 

Along with accomplishments, stakeholders noted that improvements could 
be made in several areas--including FIA, wildland fire, and invasive 
species. They also noted the need for additional research into social 
sciences related to forest issues. 

* Several stakeholders pointed out that FS R&D could improve FIA by 
adding increased specificity to the data collection efforts. They said 
that higher-resolution data collection in more locations, plus more 
frequent data collection, would help states make better-informed 
planning decisions. For example, one stakeholder suggested that more-
detailed data could help spur job creation and economic development in 
the emerging alternative energy market by helping potential investors 
in biomass power plants identify locations of sustainable supplies of 
woody biomass, which could then help determine the best places to 
build a new plant or expand an existing plant. 

* Several stakeholders also cited a need for improvements to wildland 
fire and invasive species research. For example, several stakeholders 
noted that they would benefit from more assistance in applying the 
many tools FS R&D has developed to help land managers respond to 
wildland fire. Other stakeholders told us that increased FS R&D 
research into methods for controlling or eradicating invasive species--
for example, the use of natural predators of invasive species--could 
help land managers better manage infestations. 

* Several stakeholders told us the agency should focus more attention 
on social sciences. One stakeholder noted that increasing populations 
near forests has made it essential that land managers understand the 
impacts that changing recreation habits can potentially have on these 
forests. An FS R&D official observed that in addition to understanding 
the physical science of fire, managers must also understand how the 
public will react to different fire management choices, particularly 
where communities are directly affected by those choices. 

Over the Last Decade, Spending by FS R&D Remained Relatively Flat, 
Affecting Its Hiring Patterns and Research Activities: 

Spending by FS R&D remained relatively flat during fiscal years 2000 
through 2009, with a small but growing portion of the agency's total 
spending represented by funds received from external sources such as 
universities and other federal agencies. Trends in spending varied 
across the research stations, with some experiencing increases and 
others, decreases. These spending trends have affected FS R&D's hiring 
patterns and research activities. 

Overall FS R&D Spending Remained Relatively Flat over the Last Decade, 
with an Increasing Proportion of Spending Coming from External Sources: 

Overall, the amount spent by FS R&D--using both Forest Service-
appropriated funds as well as resources from external sources such as 
cooperating agencies and organizations--remained relatively flat 
during fiscal years 2000 through 2009, with funding from external 
sources representing a small but growing percentage of total spending. 
[Footnote 15] Total nominal spending increased from $276.9 million in 
fiscal year 2000 to $369.1 million in fiscal year 2009--an average 
annual increase of 3.2 percent. After adjusting these amounts for 
inflation, the average annual increase was 0.8 percent. 

Spending Using Forest Service Appropriations: 

Resources spent using Forest Service appropriations, which constitute 
the majority of FS R&D spending, increased slightly in nominal terms 
but remained relatively flat in inflation-adjusted terms from fiscal 
year 2000 through fiscal year 2009 (see figure 2). [Footnote 16] 
Spending increased from $261.9 million in fiscal year 2000 to $337.9 
million in fiscal year 2009--an average annual increase of 2.9 
percent. After these amounts were adjusted for inflation, the average 
annual increase was 0.4 percent. 

Figure 2: Spending Using Forest Service Appropriations, Fiscal Years 
2000 through 2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: multiple line graph] 

Fiscal year: 2000; 
Nominal: $261.9 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $325.6 million. 

Fiscal year: 2001; 
Nominal: $261.5 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $317.6 million. 

Fiscal year: 2002; 
Nominal: $287.9 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $343.9 million. 

Fiscal year: 2003; 
Nominal: $336.1 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $393.4 million. 

Fiscal year: 2004; 
Nominal: $358.4 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $409 million. 

Fiscal year: 2005; 
Nominal: $314.2 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $347.3 million. 

Fiscal year: 2006; 
Nominal: $325.8 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $348.1 million. 

Fiscal year: 2007; 
Nominal: $326.7 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $339.2 million. 

Fiscal year: 2008; 
Nominal: $323.5 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $328.3 million. 

Fiscal year: 2009; 
Nominal: $337.9 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $337.9 million. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: Spending is adjusted for inflation using 2009 dollars. 

[End of figure] 

Spending may be increasing more quickly for FIA than for other types 
of research, however. Although FS R&D's appropriation comes through a 
single appropriation account for "forest and rangeland research," 
since fiscal year 2003 the annual appropriation has designated a 
portion of these funds for FIA, and FIA's portion of this enacted 
budget authority has been growing at a faster rate than FS R&D 
appropriations as a whole. The enacted budget authority for FIA 
increased from $31.7 million in fiscal year 2000 to $60.8 million in 
fiscal year 2009--an average annual increase of 7.5 percent, or about 
4.9 percent when adjusted for inflation. Although the remaining 
portion of the FS R&D budget authority increased from $170 million to 
$267 million during the same time, it grew only about half as quickly, 
with an average annual increase of 2.6 percent when adjusted for 
inflation.[Footnote 17] 

Across the research stations, spending of Forest Service 
appropriations generally increased in nominal terms, with six of the 
seven stations showing an increase from fiscal year 2000 through 
fiscal year 2009. When adjusted for inflation, however, spending 
decreased at three stations: the International Institute of Tropical 
Forestry and the Pacific Northwest and Southern research stations. The 
Forest Products Laboratory, in contrast, experienced the most growth 
in spending over this time (see figure 3). The amounts spent by each 
station varied from year to year, however, and even those stations 
that showed an overall decline in spending experienced some year-to-
year increases during the decade. For example, although the Southern 
Research Station experienced an overall decrease in spending over the 
past decade, year-to-year spending showed an uneven pattern; after a 
sharp decline from fiscal year 2000 through fiscal year 2001, spending 
increased in each of the next 3 fiscal years before declining again 
(see appendix III for more detail about year-to-year spending for each 
station). 

Figure 3: Average Annual Change in Research Station Spending Using 
Forest Service Appropriations, Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: vertical bar graph] 

Research Station: Forest Products Laboratory	
Nominal: 6.3%; 
Inflation-adjusted: 3.7%. 

Research Station: Rocky Mountain	
Nominal: 4.7%; 
Inflation-adjusted: 2.1%. 

Research Station: Northern	
Nominal: 4.1%; 
Inflation-adjusted: 1.6%. 

Research Station: Pacific Southwest	
Nominal: 3.5%; 
Inflation-adjusted: 1%. 

Research Station: Pacific Northwest	
Nominal: 0.8%; 
Inflation-adjusted: -1.6%. 

Research Station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry	
Nominal: 0.6%; 
Inflation-adjusted: -1.8%. 

Research Station: Southern	
Nominal: -0.2%; 
Inflation-adjusted: -2.6%. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: Spending is adjusted for inflation using 2009 dollars. 

[End of figure] 

Across the agency, personnel costs--that is, salaries and benefits--
constituted the largest percentage of resources spent using Forest 
Service appropriations during this time, about 61 percent of spending, 
with yearly percentages varying from 58 percent to 67 percent. Across 
the research stations, the average percentage of resources spent on 
personnel costs varied from 50 percent at the International Institute 
of Tropical Forestry to 65 percent at the Northern Research Station. 
The second largest category of spending across FS R&D was grants and 
agreements, through which FS R&D provides funds for partners, such as 
universities, to conduct research. Spending on such grants and 
agreements increased from 14 percent of spending in fiscal year 2000 
to 21 percent in fiscal year 2009--in line with FS R&D's fiscal year 
2012 goal (articulated in its 2008-2012 strategic plan) to devote 20 
percent of its appropriated funds to such "extramural" research. 

Spending Using External Sources: 

Although FS R&D spending using external sources of funding was much 
smaller than from FS R&D appropriations, spending from these sources 
increased at a faster pace over the last decade. Multiple 
organizations provide external support to FS R&D, including other 
federal agencies, states, industry, nonprofit organizations, 
universities, and others. Consistent with FS R&D's fiscal year 2012 
goal (also contained in its 2008-2012 strategic plan) to obtain a 
portion of its funding from external sources, resources spent using 
external sources increased from $15 million in fiscal year 2000 to 
$31.3 million in fiscal year 2009--an average annual increase of 8.5 
percent, or 6.0 percent after adjusting for inflation (see figure 4). 
As a proportion of the FS R&D total, spending using external sources 
increased from 5.4 percent in fiscal year 2000 to 8.5 percent in 
fiscal year 2009. Officials told us that the amount of external 
funding the agency receives has depended on several factors, including 
the capacity of partners to provide funding and the ability of FS R&D 
scientists to successfully compete for such funding. 

Figure 4: FS R&D Spending Using External Sources, Fiscal Years 2000 
through 2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: multiple line graph] 

Fiscal year: 2000; 
Nominal: $15 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $18.6 million. 

Fiscal year: 2001; 
Nominal: $17.7 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $21.5 million. 

Fiscal year: 2002; 
Nominal: $24 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $28.6 million. 

Fiscal year: 2003; 
Nominal: $27.2 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $31.8 million. 

Fiscal year: 2004; 
Nominal: $28.8 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $32.9 million. 

Fiscal year: 2005; 
Nominal: $28.8 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $31.8 million. 

Fiscal year: 2006; 
Nominal: $36.5 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $39.1 million. 

Fiscal year: 2007; 
Nominal: $34 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $35.3 million. 

Fiscal year: 2008; 
Nominal: $30.7 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $31.1 million. 

Fiscal year: 2009; 
Nominal: $31.3 million; 
Inflation-adjusted: $31.3 million. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: Spending is adjusted for inflation using 2009 dollars. 

[End of figure] 

Across the research stations, spending using external sources 
generally grew from fiscal year 2000 through fiscal year 2009, with 
average annual growth ranging from 0.5 percent at the Southern 
Research Station to 10.7 percent at the Northern Research Station, 
after adjusting for inflation. The exception to this trend was the 
Pacific Northwest Research Station, where spending using external 
sources declined 4.2 percent each year, on average, after adjusting 
for inflation. But these overall figures mask substantial year-to-year 
variation in the stations' spending of external funds. For example, at 
the Forest Products Laboratory, spending of external funds decreased 
about 35 percent from fiscal year 2006 to fiscal year 2007 but then 
increased more than 60 percent the following year (see appendix III 
for more detail). Unlike spending using Forest Service appropriations, 
most funding from external sources was spent on grants and agreements, 
which increased from 22.9 percent of such spending in fiscal year 2000 
to 55.3 percent in fiscal year 2009. The second-largest amount was 
spent on personnel costs, which decreased from about 32.5 percent in 
fiscal year 2000 to 21.7 percent in fiscal year 2009. 

Regarding the sources of external funding, from fiscal years 2005 
through 2009, the only period for which detailed data were available, 
[Footnote 18] the largest amounts of external support for FS R&D came 
from other federal agencies, followed by states and industry (see 
figure 5). Support from other federal agencies increased from $19.7 
million in 2005 to $24.2 million in 2009, or 2.7 percent after 
accounting for inflation. The Department of Defense and the Department 
of the Interior--both departments with land management 
responsibilities--provided FS R&D with the most support among the 
federal agencies. Support to FS R&D provided by some nonfederal 
sources, such as industry and universities, also increased over this 
time. In contrast, support from nonprofit organizations and states 
declined after accounting for inflation. Additional information about 
external funding also appears in appendix III. 

Figure 5: FS R&D Sources of External Funding, by Percentage 
Contributed, Fiscal Years 2005 through 2009: 

[Refer to PDF for image: pie-chart] 

Federal: 81%; 
State: 6%; 
Industry: 5%; 
Nonprofit: 4%; 
University: 2%; 
Foreign: 1%; 
Other: 1%. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: "Other" includes funding from cities, counties, tribes, local 
governments, and unidentified sources. 

[End of figure] 

In addition to financial support, FS R&D has also received various 
forms of in-kind support from project collaborators, some of which 
have allowed FS R&D to share equipment, personnel, or computing 
capacity. For example, a number of FS R&D facilities have been co- 
located with universities, which has generally reduced the amount the 
agency needs to spend to rent a facility or purchase additional 
research equipment. In addition, the Northern and Pacific Northwest 
research stations have also used joint FS R&D and university faculty 
appointments to foster stronger relationships with significant 
collaborators and sources of in-kind support. At the Forest Products 
Laboratory, officials told us that industry partners have provided 
multiple types of in-kind support, including materials, such as wood 
chips or logs that the laboratory uses in its experiments. 

Spending Trends Have Affected FS R&D's Hiring Patterns and Research 
Activities: 

Because a large percentage of each research station's budget is 
related to personnel costs, several stations have taken steps to 
reduce their staffing levels or change the type of employees they hire 
in response to the agency's flat spending trends. Officials at most 
research stations reported that when a permanent employee retires or 
leaves FS R&D, officials may not refill the vacant position with 
another permanent employee, instead leaving it vacant or filling the 
position with a temporary or term employee.[Footnote 19] Some research 
stations have gone further, offering buyouts to employees as a way to 
control personnel spending. FS R&D officials told us that replacing 
research scientists, in particular, requires a substantial commitment 
of resources because the combination of their salaries and the 
operating expenses associated with their research is higher than that 
of other staff positions. Several officials also told us that, in some 
cases, because of funding constraints, they did not refill some 
positions held by technicians--staff who typically conduct laboratory 
or field research work. 

Our analysis of agency data shows that FS R&D spending on personnel 
has remained flat, and that the number of permanent employees at FS 
R&D has declined. From fiscal year 2006 through fiscal year 2009, the 
number of permanent FS R&D employees declined from 2,058 to 1,935--an 
average annual decrease of 2 percent (see table 1).[Footnote 20] 
According to officials, at least part of this decline can be 
attributed to a reduction in administrative and clerical positions 
after the centralization of Forest Service business services beginning 
in 2005.[Footnote 21] The number of research scientists declined twice 
as fast as the overall number of permanent employees,[Footnote 22] 
from about 495 in fiscal year 2006 to about 437 in fiscal year 2009, 
an average annual decrease of 4.1 percent.[Footnote 23] 

Table 1: Number of Permanent FS R&D Employees, by Employment Type, 
Fiscal Years 2006 through 2009: 

Employment category: Administrative; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 307; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 284; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 277; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 275; 
Average annual change: -3.6%. 

Employment category: Blue collar; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 55; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 53; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 47; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 47; 
Average annual change: -5.1%. 

Employment category: Clerical; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 84; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 85; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 76; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 71; 
Average annual change: -5.5%. 

Employment category: Other; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 13; 
Average annual change: 63.0%. 

Employment category: Professional[A]; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 1,209; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 1,208; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 1,165; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 1,140; 
Average annual change: -1.9%. 

Employment category: Technical; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 400; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 391; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 359; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 389; 
Average annual change: -0.9%. 

Employment category: Total; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 2,058; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 2,024; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 1,929; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 1,935; 
Average annual change: -2.0%. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

[A] Research scientists are included in the "Professional" category. 

[End of table] 

The decline in research scientists is part of a larger decline in the 
number of research scientists at FS R&D over the past several decades, 
as their numbers have decreased from approximately 1,000 in 1985. Term 
employees likewise declined during fiscal years 2006 through 2009, 
from 302 to 164, while the number of temporary employees fluctuated 
between 504 and 580 over that time. Across research stations, the 
number of permanent employees declined at five stations and remained 
relatively unchanged for the remaining two stations from fiscal years 
2006 through 2009. (See appendix III for more information about 
employment trends at the research stations.) 

Some officials and scientists we spoke with were concerned that these 
staffing trends have reduced FS R&D's capacity to conduct research 
because fewer permanent scientists and technicians remain to carry out 
the work; they were also worried about FS R&D's ability to maintain 
its long-term research because of increased reliance on term and 
temporary employees. On the other hand, some FS R&D officials pointed 
out advantages to hiring term and temporary employees. For example, a 
particular research project may require specific expertise only for a 
finite amount of time, and hiring a term employee to fill this need 
allows the research station to harness that expertise without 
committing to maintaining it indefinitely--which is especially 
important if the expertise is unlikely to be needed for future 
projects. By not permanently filling scientist or technician 
positions, officials told us the agency retained the financial 
flexibility needed to conduct new research and maintain existing 
research platforms, including facilities, equipment, long-term plots, 
and other needed research elements. 

Regarding external sources of funding, several FS R&D officials noted 
that increasing use of this funding, while a small portion of overall 
FS R&D spending, can have both positive and negative impacts. Several 
scientists and officials reported that external sources of support 
allowed them to expand the scope of their research by initiating work 
on additional research topics they would not otherwise have had the 
funds to pursue or to accelerate existing work--"to run where we would 
have walked instead," in the words of one scientist. Some scientists 
also noted that, given the increasing demands on FS R&D appropriated 
funds, they have increasingly used external funds to help pay for 
research-related operating expenses. 

In contrast, some scientists noted potential drawbacks in relying on 
external funding. Some FS R&D officials and scientists commented that 
external funding is generally available to support projects that span 
no more than a few years, and increasing reliance on external funding 
could therefore lead to a shift in FS R&D's balance between basic and 
applied research if more of its scientists' time were spent answering 
shorter-rather than longer-term research questions. Others, however, 
told us that pursuing external funding has helped ensure that FS R&D 
works on research questions relevant to stakeholders' needs, because 
external funding tends to indicate the priorities of the broader 
research and user community. Furthermore, some told us that it can be 
time-consuming to identify and apply for such funding and that time 
spent on these tasks reduces the amount of time available for research. 

FS R&D Has Recently Taken a Number of Steps to Improve Its Ability to 
Fulfill Its Mission, but Challenges Remain, Particularly in Science 
Delivery: 

FS R&D has recently taken steps to improve its ability to fulfill its 
mission in a number of areas, including science delivery, research 
relevance, organizational structure, research funding allocation, 
research agenda setting, and coordination with other federal research 
agencies. Despite the agency's efforts, however, FS R&D officials and 
stakeholders identified challenges associated with these areas, 
particularly with regard to FS R&D's ability to deliver the results of 
its research. In addition, agency officials identified several other 
challenges, which impede the agency's ability to carry out its day-to-
day work. 

Modifications to Science Delivery: 

FS R&D has worked to create a more formal system for delivering the 
results of its research, known as science delivery, at multiple levels 
within the agency. FS R&D officials told us that at the national 
level, FS R&D in 2005 created a National Science Application Team and 
the position of National Science Application Coordinator, both focused 
on science delivery. According to officials, the team aims primarily 
at facilitating cross-station communication and identifying areas for 
strengthening science application activities throughout FS R&D. The 
team includes representatives from each station, as well as 
headquarters personnel. To date, according to an FS R&D official, the 
team has focused on identifying opportunities to collaborate across 
research stations so as to leverage each station's strengths. In 
addition to these actions, the Forest Service's 2007-2012 strategic 
plan recognized the importance of science delivery by including it as 
one of seven agency goals. 

At the research station level, according to agency officials, science 
delivery positions have been or are being established at each station, 
although science delivery has evolved differently at each station and 
stations vary in the way they provide science delivery. For example, 
an FS R&D official told us the Pacific Northwest Research Station in 
the 1990s recognized the need for increased emphasis on science 
delivery to a broader audience, in part because of the Northwest 
Forest Plan, a highly controversial federal land management planning 
effort that required rigorous science to support decisions involving 
old-growth forests and threatened species. The station subsequently 
created a Focused Science Delivery program, whose mission is to 
enhance the usefulness of scientific information, including 
synthesizing information from a wide range of disciplines and 
delivering it to clients in clear and accessible formats. Likewise, 
the Rocky Mountain Research Station created the Science Application 
and Integration program, which is dedicated to making scientific 
information and research applicable to natural resource management and 
planning. The station is also working with partners to maximize 
efforts to address land managers' needs.[Footnote 24] On the other 
hand, science delivery at the Forest Products Laboratory has been 
emphasized since its creation, according to laboratory officials, 
mainly because much of the focus of the laboratory's research is on 
applied products, such as new wood materials for the housing sector. 

Despite these efforts, officials and scientists throughout FS R&D, as 
well as numerous stakeholders, told us that FS R&D has not placed 
sufficient emphasis on science delivery. Some noted that, even with 
the agency's recent efforts, the agency does not have a consistent 
approach to science delivery, often leaving it up to individual 
scientists, who vary in the amount of time and effort they devote to 
it. Without effective delivery of FS R&D's research results, land 
managers, policymakers, and others may be unable to promptly and 
effectively use the knowledge, data, and tools FS R&D produces, and FS 
R&D cannot ensure that its research is being used to its greatest 
potential. In part, according to a senior FS R&D official we spoke 
with, the struggle to provide adequate science delivery stems from the 
contradictions inherent in FS R&D's status as a research organization 
within a land management agency. As a result, FS R&D must balance the 
limited time and resources available to its researchers between, on 
the one hand, basic research and the resulting publications in peer- 
reviewed journals and, on the other hand, delivering the results of 
that research and making sure it is useful and understandable to end 
users. Many stakeholders told us that although publishing research in 
peer-reviewed journals is important for the credibility of scientists 
and their research, delivery of results through other mechanisms--such 
as summary findings, workshops, or one-on-one interactions between 
scientists and users of FS R&D-developed work--can often be more 
useful to land managers and decision makers. 

Nevertheless, many stakeholders and numerous FS R&D researchers and 
officials told us the agency values publications in peer-reviewed 
journals over other science-delivery mechanisms. In large part, 
according to several scientists and others we spoke with, this view 
prevails because the system for appraising individual researchers' 
performance continues to emphasize publication in peer-reviewed 
journals. To evaluate researchers, FS R&D uses the Office of Personnel 
Management's "research grade evaluation guide" to measure individual 
researchers' performance in what is often referred to as the paneling 
process. The guide was revised in 2006 to, among other things, place 
greater emphasis on communicating research results to users through 
mechanisms other than peer-reviewed journals (such as summary findings 
or workshops) as part of the measure of scientists' work. Officials 
told us that, consistent with these revisions, FS R&D made an effort 
to train panel reviewers to place greater emphasis on these other 
forms of science delivery as a component of their performance. Despite 
these changes, several FS R&D officials and stakeholders told us that 
the emphasis placed on peer-reviewed journals, compared with other 
forms of science delivery, during the paneling process varies among 
panels and depends on the perspective of the panel chairperson; they 
also said that many panelists continue to emphasize peer-reviewed 
journals over other forms of science delivery. 

Further complicating the science delivery issue is the potential 
overlap in science delivery roles between FS R&D and State and Private 
Forestry, another Forest Service program. State and Private Forestry 
is authorized by the Cooperative Forestry Assistance Act of 1978 to 
carry out a program of technology implementation to "ensure that new 
technology is introduced, new information is integrated into existing 
technology, and forest resources research findings are promptly made 
available to state forestry personnel, private forest landowners and 
managers, vendors, forest operators, wood processors, public agencies, 
and individuals."[Footnote 25] State and Private Forestry maintains 
staff across the country to assist in this mission, some of whom are 
closely associated with FS R&D's work. Because both FS R&D and State 
and Private Forestry have missions to carry out science delivery, and 
because their activities can be closely intermingled, the programs' 
science delivery responsibilities have not always been clearly 
delineated, according to officials, highlighting the need for both 
programs to work closely together to minimize duplication and stretch 
limited resources by taking advantage of available expertise across 
the programs. The need for greater clarity about FS R&D's science 
delivery role in relation to State and Private Forestry is consistent 
with the results of the Forest Service's own 2009 assessment of 
science delivery within the agency, which highlights deficiencies in 
this area, such as a lack of coordination among those conducting 
research and those delivering research information and tools, and 
provides suggestions for improvement, including greater coordination 
of efforts between FS R&D and State and Private Forestry.[Footnote 26] 
FS R&D officials told us, however, that the agency has not taken steps 
to implement the report's recommendations and has not established time 
frames for doing so, nor has the agency otherwise assessed the 
effectiveness of its efforts to improve science delivery, including 
the creation of the National Science Application Team and its changes 
to science delivery at the research stations. 

It is important to note, however, that while many FS R&D officials and 
stakeholders suggested the need for greater attention to science 
delivery, many also emphasized the value of FS R&D's basic and long-
term research and cautioned that too great a shift in resources from 
basic research to science delivery would also be inappropriate. Much 
of the applied research and science delivery relevant to current 
issues rests on the findings of basic, long-term research, so it is 
important to continue investing resources in such research, according 
to these stakeholders. For example, one State and Private Forestry 
official we interviewed told us that he found the wildland fire-
related tools and assessments developed by FS R&D to be very useful, 
but he also emphasized the need for FS R&D to continue to invest 
resources in core fire science, which should not be driven by short-
term needs, to maintain the agency's ability to develop such tools. 

New Approaches for Ensuring Research Relevance: 

FS R&D has implemented new approaches to determine the relevance of 
its research work to customers and to assess its quality and 
performance, including customer surveys, external peer reviews of the 
seven strategic program areas, and an increased use of narrative 
descriptions to describe its accomplishments. In 2006, FS R&D began 
using a customer satisfaction survey to help identify areas where 
customers believed it excelled or, conversely, needed 
improvement.[Footnote 27] Conducted periodically, the survey allows 
officials to assess overall customer satisfaction with FS R&D over 
time in comparison with other federal research agencies. According to 
survey results provided to us by FS R&D, the 2009 survey resulted in a 
75-point score, which is in line with scores for other federal 
government providers of information, which typically score in the 70-
point range, and was an improvement over FS R&D's 2006 score of 72. 
The survey also compares customer satisfaction across strategic 
program areas and research stations in a variety of categories, 
including accessibility of data, accuracy of products, and relevance 
and quality of work.[Footnote 28] FS R&D officials told us they regard 
the information and recommendations provided by the survey as useful 
for making better-informed determinations about the areas of work that 
require greatest improvement and are likely to have the greatest 
impact. 

FS R&D also conducts external peer reviews that assess the relevance, 
quality, and performance of research conducted within each of its 
seven strategic program areas, an effort that began in 2006.[Footnote 
29] The relevance category, for example, includes assessing the extent 
to which each strategic program area has clear societal benefits, 
produces products that are being used and have potential impacts, 
seeks user input in setting the agenda, and is not inappropriately 
duplicative. The extent to which the reviews adequately measure 
performance in these areas, however, was questioned by several 
external reviewers as well as some agency officials. Although the 
strategic program areas are purposefully broad, this breadth of 
research coverage means that the work conducted under one area may 
also be relevant to another, complicating the review process. For 
example, it is difficult to fully evaluate how well Water, Air, and 
Soils is performing when areas of science relevant to that program 
area, such as the effects of smoke on air quality, may be evaluated 
under Wildland Fire. Because different external panels are assembled 
for each of the various peer reviews, it is hard to know where--or if--
all areas of research were evaluated. Another concern on the part of 
some stakeholders was the degree to which end users provided feedback 
about the various strategic program areas and the implications of 
selecting certain end users for, or excluding them from, the peer-
review process. Given that the strategic program areas and the review 
process are relatively new, FS R&D is currently evaluating the 
adequacy of such reviews in measuring performance, as well as ways in 
which the process might be improved. 

Although FS R&D measures its performance in part with quantitative 
measures, such as number of publications and, in certain science 
areas, the numbers of tools developed, officials explained that it can 
be difficult to quantify many of its research accomplishments, such as 
FS R&D's research impact on preventing the outbreak of, for example, 
an invasive pest. To help overcome this difficulty, FS R&D 
communicates its accomplishments in reports through narrative 
descriptions of the scientific and societal benefits of its work. 
[Footnote 30] In addition, researchers may work for years on a 
particular problem, which may not generate immediate, measurable 
outcomes but, rather, a valuable foundation for future 
accomplishments. For example, the information FS R&D currently 
contributes to climate research is based on data that have been 
collected over several decades. 

Changes to FS R&D's Organizational Structure: 

Within the past few decades, the physical and organizational 
structures of FS R&D's research stations have also changed 
significantly. First, the makeup of the research stations changed, as 
some research stations merged and one split into two stations. Second, 
the research stations reorganized their work units into science themes 
or areas of research that are broader than in the past, to foster a 
more multidisciplinary and integrated approach to research. 

Three of the present research stations resulted from merging 
previously existing stations, done in part to reduce overhead and 
administrative costs, as well as to improve customer service and make 
research results more accessible and useful. The Northern Research 
Station, for example, is the product of the agency's 2006 
consolidation of the former Northeastern and North Central research 
stations; the Southern Research Station, formed in 1995, consists of 
the former Southeastern Forest Experiment Station and Southern Forest 
Experiment Station; and the Rocky Mountain Research Station, formed in 
1997, consists of the former Intermountain Research Station and Rocky 
Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station.[Footnote 31] According 
to FS R&D officials and documents, these mergers allowed related 
research to come under a single management team, while also allowing 
the stations to make better use of smaller administrative staffs; 
provided facilities for large-scale, multidisciplinary studies; and 
facilitated integrated, landscape-scale research programs. In 
contrast, the International Institute of Tropical Forestry, formerly a 
unit of the Southern Forest Experiment Station, was made an 
independent institute with an expanded mission in 1993. 

In addition, beginning in the late 1990s, research stations 
reorganized their work into broad science themes or areas of research. 
Before that time, each research station was structured around discrete 
research work units, which were geographically based and covered 
specialized scientific issues. About 140 research work units existed 
across FS R&D, according to a FS R&D headquarters official, each of 
which included one to five scientists to carry out a narrow scope of 
work. As issues the scientists were studying grew in complexity, 
according to this official, more integration among disciplines was 
required to answer research questions. Officials at one research 
station, acknowledging their more complex research needs, observed 
that having narrowly focused research work units was no longer 
appropriate for the agency. 

In response, FS R&D decided to consolidate the units into broader 
"programs," which officials told us was to foster a multidisciplinary, 
integrated approach to research and reduce the time scientists spent 
on administrative tasks. While the research stations were not required 
to move from the research work unit model to the program model, the 
Deputy Chief of FS R&D encouraged them to do so, and all stations have 
now adopted the new approach.[Footnote 32] As a result, some research 
stations have undertaken major realignments of their units. For 
example, the Pacific Northwest Research Station has de-emphasized some 
traditional scientific areas while emphasizing new ones, moving from 
26 research work units to six programs: Ecological Process and 
Function; Focused Science Delivery; Goods, Services, and Values; Land 
and Watershed Management; Resource Monitoring and Assessment; and 
Threat Characterization and Management. 

The consolidation of research work units produced a number of 
benefits, according to FS R&D officials we spoke with. First, the 
consolidation allowed FS R&D to respond to increasingly complex 
research needs by adopting a more multidisciplinary and integrated 
approach. Second, according to officials, the consolidation of units 
shifted control back to research station management, allowing managers 
to be more strategic in setting research priorities because those 
priorities were determined centrally by the stations rather than 
individually by the units. For example, according to officials at the 
Rocky Mountain Research Station, in the past when employees resigned 
or retired, the research work units were permitted to directly refill 
the position. Now, the management team at the research station decides 
which vacancies to refill, including whether to shift vacant positions 
to other program areas that are higher priorities for the station. And 
third, the consolidation allowed FS R&D to use its resources more 
efficiently, according to agency officials, because the consolidation 
purged some traditional lines of research that FS R&D officials said 
were no longer productive or relevant. Consolidation also reduced 
overhead costs for FS R&D, as well as the time scientists spend on 
administration, according to officials, because it allowed FS R&D to 
consolidate scientists into fewer facilities. For example, as part of 
its consolidation, the Southern Research Station closed one of its 
laboratories and was also able to move two employees who were using 
Agricultural Research Service space into space owned by FS R&D. As a 
result, FS R&D was able to cease paying overhead costs for its use of 
the previous space. Despite these benefits, some officials described 
disadvantages to consolidating research units. For example, officials 
from the Southern Research Station said that consolidation decreased 
the station's on-the-ground presence in some places covered by the 
station, including Kentucky and Tennessee. Decreasing a station's 
presence may limit its partnerships with nonfederal entities, such as 
with industry, because local relationships can be more difficult to 
develop. 

Although these recent changes may enhance FS R&D's work within 
stations, the decentralized nature of the agency's organizational 
structure emphasizes the need for collaboration across stations, and 
concerns have been raised about whether such collaboration could be 
improved. In particular, the external peer reviews of FS R&D's 
strategic program areas identified concerns about the extent to which 
research is being effectively coordinated across the research 
stations. For example, one peer review described a lack of 
coordination among research stations on wildland fire research, while 
another review found a lack of coordination in some areas of climate 
change research. On the other hand, while these concerns were echoed 
by a number of agency officials we talked with, other FS R&D 
officials, as well as agency stakeholders, noted a number of 
accomplishments that have come out of cross-station collaboration, 
such as i-Tree and the Westwide Climate Change Resource Center Web 
site, developed by the Pacific Northwest, Pacific Southwest, and Rocky 
Mountain research stations.[Footnote 33] 

Changes to Research Station Funding Allocation Processes: 

Along with consolidating their research programs, some research 
stations have also been revamping the process they use for allocating 
resources among programs and projects. At the Rocky Mountain Research 
Station, for example, officials told us that the new process begins 
when each program, laboratory, and experimental forest provides the 
station with its initial funding request. Subsequently, on the basis 
of these funding requests, as well as discussions about what programs 
or projects might be expanded or cut, the station's leadership team 
determines final allocations to each program, laboratory, and 
experimental forest. Later, a midyear review takes place to identify 
programs or projects that are unlikely to use all their funds; such 
funds are subsequently reallocated through a competitive process 
geared toward the station's priorities. Station officials told us that 
this new budgeting process better positions them to respond to 
emerging needs and priorities and helps clarify what the station's 
research dollars are funding. Similarly, the Pacific Southwest 
Research Station is implementing a new allocation process based on the 
one used by the Rocky Mountain station. In the past, according to 
station officials, each research work unit received a certain 
percentage of the station's total allocation, and this percentage did 
not change from year to year. By keeping the percentages fixed, these 
officials told us, the station did not have the needed flexibility to 
make funding changes in response to changing research priorities. The 
new process, according to a station official, allows managers to make 
more strategic and better-informed decisions. 

Other stations' processes likewise are aimed at ensuring that research 
dollars are directed to the highest-priority research areas, rather 
than simply continuing previous funding patterns. At the Pacific 
Northwest Research Station, officials told us they use four factors to 
guide resource allocations so they can balance the need for basic 
science with emerging research areas. The first factor is the period 
of science delivery: the station allocates about 40 percent of its 
resources to research expected to deliver knowledge and tools within 1 
to 3 years. Second, officials consider the relevance of each research 
program or project and its broader applicability; third, the regional 
significance of the research; and fourth, the extent to which a 
program or project is in an emerging growth area. At the Forest 
Products Laboratory, officials told us that funding decisions are 
based largely on the research needs identified by the station's 
scientists and assistant directors, who meet to discuss research needs 
and determine where to make trade-offs between research areas. 

Some officials also noted that FS R&D leverages its staff resources by 
considering resource needs and vacancies across stations and that 
applying resources across geographic boundaries--or even permanently 
transferring researchers to locations where they can be better used--
allows the agency to apply its expertise quickly and efficiently. By 
way of example, an official at the Pacific Southwest Research Station 
told us that a bark beetle researcher at the station spends as much 
time in other states experiencing bark beetle outbreaks as he does in 
California, where the station is located, and that, even though these 
other states are covered by other research stations, it is more 
efficient to meet this research need through existing expertise than 
to hire scientists in these other locations. Because FS R&D leverages 
its resources across geographic boundaries, according to officials, 
the location of staffing resources around the country does not limit 
the agency's ability to respond to research needs even in areas where 
FS R&D staff are not permanently located. 

Increased Stakeholder Involvement in Setting Research Agendas: 

FS R&D has been renewing its efforts to seek and obtain input on 
research agendas from stakeholders--including federal and state land 
managers, universities, and industry--by, for example, conducting 
outreach to identify stakeholders' research needs and soliciting their 
input before undertaking particular research efforts. Within the last 
several years, FS R&D has participated in several nationwide, large- 
scale efforts to identify research priorities related to forestry. For 
example, beginning in 2005, FS R&D participated in a series of 
workshops as part of the Forest Service Outlook Project, aimed at 
developing a long-term research agenda in collaboration with the broad 
forestry community, including federal, state, and local government 
agencies; the business community; nongovernmental organizations; and 
academic institutions. Also in 2005, officials from FS R&D 
participated in creating the Forest Products Industry Technology 
Roadmap, a report aimed at helping reinvent and reinvigorate the U.S.-
based forest products industry, including the role of FS R&D research 
in doing so.[Footnote 34] Other, program-specific efforts exist as 
well; for example, officials pointed out that the FIA program holds 
annual meetings with regional and national user groups on the 
program's implementation. 

Many stakeholders we interviewed told us that they meet regularly with 
research station directors to discuss research priorities and research 
progress and that, particularly over the last 5 to 6 years, their 
relationships with FS R&D officials and researchers have continued to 
improve. For example, one stakeholder told us that the Rocky Mountain 
Research Station Director holds quarterly meetings with the Regional 
Foresters of the four National Forest System regions covered by the 
station to learn more about their research needs. The same Station 
Director recently held a needs assessment meeting to solicit input 
from foresters at national forests, as well as state foresters and 
research station scientists, about what they perceive to be gaps in 
research. In addition, several stakeholders told us that FS R&D 
researchers are generally willing to take stakeholder interests into 
account when implementing research activities, and some pointed out 
instances in which researchers adapted their research to address 
stakeholder concerns. For example, one stakeholder noted that FS R&D 
researchers at the Silas Little Experimental Forest in New Jersey 
added a component to their work in response to state forester concerns 
about loss of canopy cover and fire impact resulting from gypsy moths, 
an issue of particular concern for northeastern foresters. In another 
example, a western stakeholder we interviewed told us that land 
managers from the National Forest System met with an FS R&D researcher 
studying the locations of, and reasons for the decline in, bull trout, 
a federally listed threatened species. The land managers wanted 
information about specific aspects of bull trout habitat that the 
researcher had not initially included in his research plan, but, as a 
result of the meeting, the researcher incorporated these additional 
aspects into his study, thereby increasing its relevance. Several 
stakeholders also mentioned that regional forums, such as the Western 
Forestry Leadership Council--a partnership between state and federal 
government forestry leaders in which FS R&D officials and scientists 
interact directly with state foresters in the West--were effective for 
discussing both research priorities and work under way. 

Despite strong relationships and multiple opportunities to provide 
input, however, several stakeholders we interviewed believed that more 
could be done to increase end-user input in setting research agendas. 
Some stakeholders told us they did not always have sufficient 
opportunity to voice their research interests and suggested that a 
more systematic approach to communication with FS R&D was needed to 
ensure their input was considered. According to one stakeholder, 
private landowners may have fewer opportunities to provide input on 
research agendas because conferences where research agendas are 
discussed may be too expensive for them to attend or because they are 
not made aware of such opportunities to participate. Similarly, 
despite FS R&D efforts to solicit university input, the university 
representatives we interviewed told us that FS R&D should make a more 
concerted effort to involve academia in FS R&D's early planning 
efforts. 

Although considering the priority needs of stakeholders is important, 
FS R&D officials and researchers must also maintain discretion to 
prioritize research they consider important even in the face of 
stakeholder disagreement. Officials at the Forest Products Laboratory, 
for example, told us that stakeholder input into the laboratory's work 
is reviewed annually through a peer-review process conducted by 
multiple end users--including other research stations, universities, 
and industry--to ensure the laboratory is working on relevant science 
and evaluate the work it considers for the future. Officials told us 
that some panelists criticized the laboratory over the past 20 years 
for conducting research on nontoxic wood preservatives to serve as 
alternatives to the widespread use of traditional wood preservatives, 
stating that such research was unnecessary. Because of concerns about 
traditional wood preservatives' potential harm to human health and the 
environment, however, scientists and managers at the laboratory felt 
that research into alternatives was important. As a result, they 
continued to pursue this research despite end-user suggestions, which 
officials told us proved to be important because the use of the older 
preservatives is now restricted.[Footnote 35] 

Emphasis on Coordination with Other Agencies: 

FS R&D has emphasized coordination with other federal research 
agencies at various levels to leverage expertise and resource capacity 
and set complementary research agendas. For example, current federal 
interest in using biomass as a reliable source of energy requires 
integrating various components of research and information unique to 
several different agencies, such as methods for acquiring a sufficient 
supply of biomass feedstock and converting this feedstock into energy. 
Officials we interviewed from other agencies provided a large range of 
research issues in which FS R&D is currently coordinating with 
multiple federal agencies or research entities, including bioenergy, 
climate change, water quality, restoration, and management across 
landscapes, and many stated that coordination is increasing. For 
example, one official from USGS noted that as recently as 5 years ago, 
he was aware of few coordinated efforts across the Forest Service and 
USGS in the area of water research, but the situation has since 
changed. 

At the national level, FS R&D and other agency officials described the 
coordination undertaken with other federal agencies in a number of 
ways, including interagency working groups, conferences, and regular 
meetings. Within the Department of Agriculture, FS R&D broadly 
coordinates its research with other component research agencies, 
including the Agricultural Research Service and National Institute of 
Food and Agriculture, by holding regular meetings to discuss research 
policy, mutual research interests, and potential areas for 
coordination. FS R&D also coordinates with agencies outside of the 
Department of Agriculture, including USGS and the Bureau of Land 
Management in the Department of the Interior, the Environmental 
Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, and the National Science 
Foundation. Current efforts include collaboration with Energy on 
biomass, USGS on carbon sequestration,[Footnote 36] and multiple 
agencies on climate change. Specifically: 

* Biomass. The departments of Agriculture and Energy co-chair a 
biomass research and development board charged with coordinating 
programs across federal agencies to promote the use of biofuels and 
biobased products. The Department of Agriculture has the lead on 
biomass feedstock research while Energy has the lead on techniques to 
convert feedstock into fuel, according to FS R&D and other agency 
officials. Within the Department of Agriculture, FS R&D and the 
Agricultural Research Service are developing a network of Biomass 
Research Centers, through which they will coordinate their agencies' 
efforts to provide biomass for the biofuels industry. The network will 
comprise existing Agricultural Research Service and Forest Service 
facilities and scientists, whose combined efforts, along with 
partnerships with universities and private companies, are expected to 
help accelerate the commercial production of biofuels, biopower, and 
other biobased products. 

* Carbon sequestration. The Energy Independence and Security Act of 
2007 directs federal agencies to coordinate on a number of efforts, 
including an assessment of national capacity for geological 
sequestration of carbon. Through the act, the Secretary of the 
Interior was directed to complete this assessment with other federal 
agencies. The assessment has geological and biological components, 
according to an official, with FIA data from FS R&D expected to play a 
substantial role in the assessment. 

* Climate change. FS R&D collaborates with multiple federal agencies 
on issues related to climate change. For example, FS R&D is involved 
in the U.S. Global Change Research Program, which coordinates and 
integrates federal research on changes in the global environment and 
their implications for society. Thirteen federal departments and 
agencies participate in the program, including the departments of 
Commerce, Defense, and Energy, and the National Aeronautics and Space 
Administration. FS R&D also works directly with USGS on a number of 
climate change initiatives. For example, USGS is developing eight 
climate change response centers around the country; the Forest Service 
is on the steering committee for the centers, and FS R&D and USGS will 
conduct joint research out of these centers. 

FS R&D is also involved in a number of interagency efforts at regional 
and local levels. For example, FS R&D is working with multiple federal 
agencies in a variety of climate change partnership efforts. One such 
partnership is the Consortium for Integrated Climate Research in 
Western Mountains, a network of scientists, resource managers, and 
policymakers from the Forest Service, the National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration, USGS, and universities that promotes 
climate monitoring, research, communication, and decision support in 
the West. FS R&D is also involved in the Great Basin Resource and 
Management Partnership, through which FS R&D and a number of other 
federal agencies, including the Bureau of Land Management, the Fish 
and Wildlife Service, and USGS, as well as nonfederal entities such as 
universities and nongovernmental organizations, are working to better 
link research to management in the Great Basin, considered by some 
scientists to be one of the most endangered ecoregions in the United 
States.[Footnote 37] At the local level, officials told us that in 
Alaska, scientists from USGS and FS R&D worked together on a joint 
project to forecast shifts in polar bear populations because of 
climate change, work influential in the listing of the polar bear as a 
threatened species under the Endangered Species Act.[Footnote 38] In 
the Southern Research Station, the Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory was 
designated as a National Science Foundation Long-Term Ecological 
Research Site in 1980. At this site, FS R&D, the National Science 
Foundation, and the University of Georgia share facilities, staff, 
equipment, and funding to coordinate research on rainfall, 
evaporation, and stream flow. 

In general, according to many officials from FS R&D and other 
agencies, FS R&D's scope of work complements, rather than duplicates, 
other agencies' work. For example, while FS R&D and the Agricultural 
Research Service both do research on plants, FS R&D focuses mainly on 
trees while the Agricultural Research Service focuses on herbaceous 
(nonwoody) crops, resulting in minimal overlap, according to 
officials. Similarly, FS R&D and USGS both conduct water research, but 
the bulk of FS R&D's research on water focuses on forest systems and 
wildland fire, according to officials, while USGS's water program has 
more breadth and provides more of a "census report" of water, 
including information on water supply and quality. The generally 
complementary, rather than overlapping, nature of research prevails in 
part because FS R&D's structure and mission differ from those of other 
federal agencies conducting research, according to FS R&D and other 
agency officials we spoke to. Several officials at various agencies 
told us that FS R&D's unique position as part of a land management 
agency gives its work a specific focus that tends not to overlap with 
the work of other federal research agencies, which are primarily 
research agencies with no land management responsibilities. 

Other Challenges in Carrying Out Day-to-Day Activities: 

FS R&D officials also reported several challenges that impede their 
ability to conduct their day-to-day research, including computing and 
information technology, human capital, and other administrative issues. 

Computer and Information Technology Issues: 

Many FS R&D officials and scientists told us that issues related to 
computer and information technology impede their ability to carry out 
their work. FS R&D officials explained that researchers generally 
require greater computing capacity than most other Forest Service 
employees; for example, many researchers collect substantial amounts 
of data and develop and use complex software applications. To 
understand the specific information technology needs of FS R&D, an 
official from the Chief Information Office for the Forest Service 
conducted a review of technical challenges for FS R&D, which began in 
August 2007 and produced an internal report in January 2009. The 
report identified a number of "priority issues," along with 
recommendations, some of which were also frequently mentioned during 
our interviews with FS R&D officials. These include insufficient 
customer service and support, with multiple days needed to resolve 
routine computer issues; the long technical approval process for 
researchers to use technology outside current Forest Service 
information architecture; and insufficient computing capacity, which 
can require researchers to rely on partners such as universities to 
store and run FS R&D data and programs. 

Since the report was issued, the Chief Information Office has taken 
some steps to address cited issues, and some FS R&D officials told us 
that information technology support is improving. For example, 
officials told us that the information office created a customer 
service representative specifically for FS R&D and is revamping its 
system for entering requests for technical approval. In addition, 
officials told us the information office has implemented a pilot 
project aimed at improving high-end computing capacity. 

Human Capital: 

Several FS R&D officials told us that the Forest Service's hiring 
process sometimes impedes research. Human resource management was one 
of the administrative functions the Forest Service centralized, a move 
that may have contributed to dissatisfaction with the hiring process 
because research stations no longer have human resource support on 
site as they did in the past. Many FS R&D officials complained about 
the length of that process, pointing out that, because the process can 
take so long, temporary employees may begin work later than 
anticipated, shortening the time they have to collect data for 
research projects. In some cases, data can be collected only in 
certain months of the year; for example, the field season in high 
alpine areas may be limited to a short period in the summer, 
exacerbating the effects of hiring delays. In addition, according to 
officials, the length of the process can sometimes cause research 
stations to lose good candidates, if those candidates choose another 
employer who can hire them more quickly. 

Another issue that FS R&D faces when hiring new employees is that 
position descriptions are sometimes changed by the Forest Service's 
Human Resource Management office because employees there may not 
understand the unique needs of research stations, according to FS R&D 
officials. In scientific research, specific qualifications need to be 
considered in filling research positions. For example, some officials 
told us that a researcher may need to hire a technician who can mimic 
certain bird calls and will include that requirement in the position 
description. Human resource management officials, however, may take 
the specification out because they think it is superfluous and too 
specific. Likewise, two research positions with the same title might 
require different skills or expertise, but, according to officials we 
interviewed, human resource management officials may not understand 
the distinctions. 

Administrative and Legal Challenges: 

Administrative and legal challenges were also cited as hampering FS 
R&D research. For example, the Paperwork Reduction Act contains review 
requirements associated with developing surveys, which FS R&D 
researchers told us are an obstacle to using surveys to obtain 
information from nonfederal stakeholders.[Footnote 39] The act 
prohibits federal agencies from conducting or sponsoring information 
collection unless they have prior approval from the Office of 
Management and Budget. The act requires that information collection be 
approved by the office when facts or opinions are solicited from 10 or 
more people, including through surveys, questionnaires, and focus 
groups. FS R&D officials told us that this process is long and 
arduous--noting that it can take 1 to 2 years to get surveys approved--
which can prevent researchers from obtaining timely information and 
sometimes dissuade them from administering surveys to nonfederal 
stakeholders so as to avoid the process entirely.[Footnote 40] 
Consequently, these researchers rely more heavily on federal 
stakeholders to obtain input, use secondary data that already exist, 
or depend on external partners to collect information for them. The 
requirements associated with the act affect social science in 
particular, according to officials, because social scientists tend to 
rely more heavily on data developed through surveys and questionnaires 
than do scientists from other disciplines. 

An additional legal and administrative challenge noted by FS R&D 
officials is that the agency is restricted from directly applying for 
certain funding sources. Under the National Science Foundation's grant 
policy, this agency does not normally support research or education 
activities by scientists, engineers, or educators employed by other 
federal agencies.[Footnote 41] Accordingly, FS R&D does not apply for 
National Science Foundation grants (and some other grants) as the 
principal investigator and funding recipient. Rather, FS R&D must work 
with a nonfederal entity (e.g., a university) that applies for this 
funding, meaning that the nonfederal entity becomes the principal 
investigator and funding recipient. Some officials believed these 
grants should be open to the entire science community and noted that 
funding FS R&D directly may be more efficient because FS R&D 
researchers may have expertise in certain areas, as well as the 
ability to maintain long-term research. 

Conclusions: 

The breadth of the research carried out by FS R&D, and the value 
placed on that work by the many who use it, reflects the agency's 
efforts to produce high-quality scientific information and tools to 
help manage our nation's forests and rangelands. This research is 
likely to be even more important in the future, as a complex web of 
increasing stresses on ecosystems crisscrossing multiple ownership 
boundaries tests the ability of land managers, policymakers, and 
others to respond. FS R&D has positioned itself to respond to these 
stresses, as evidenced by its research into climate change, wildland 
fire, invasive species, and other topics of immediate interest, by the 
steps it has taken to help ensure its research is relevant, and by its 
emphasis on cross-cutting research that spans multiple issues, 
ecological settings, research partners, and customers. 

But research is only part of FS R&D's mission, and the ultimate 
success of the research program depends on effective ways to deliver 
the resulting knowledge and technology. Recognition is growing on the 
part of FS R&D management that more emphasis needs to be placed on 
this process, as shown by the steps taken to (1) create the National 
Science Application Team, (2) increase emphasis on science delivery at 
the research station level, and (3) commission a science delivery 
review in 2009. Nevertheless, the agency has not fully assessed the 
effectiveness of its efforts to improve science delivery, which 
remains a largely ad hoc process that is often subject to the 
availability and interests of individual scientists. Part of this 
unevenness arises because individual performance assessments emphasize 
research and science delivery through peer-reviewed publications more 
than other methods of science delivery that often convey research 
results and the use of those results to broader audiences. Without 
assessing the adequacy of steps taken to improve the agency's science 
delivery efforts--and without ensuring that individual performance 
assessments appropriately value and reward these other methods of 
science delivery--the benefits of FS R&D's extensive research efforts 
may not be fully realized. 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

To maintain and strengthen the science delivery role of FS R&D and 
help the agency capitalize on the steps it has taken in this area, we 
recommend that the Secretary of Agriculture direct the Chief of the 
Forest Service to take the following two actions: 

* Assess the effectiveness of recent steps FS R&D has taken to improve 
science delivery from FS R&D to land managers and other stakeholders, 
including the extent to which these steps have helped ensure that FS 
R&D's work is disseminated beyond the agency and communicated to its 
broad range of potential stakeholders. In assessing the effectiveness 
of these steps, the Chief should consider the recommendations of the 
Forest Service's 2009 assessment of science delivery. 

* Take steps to ensure that individual performance assessments better 
balance the various types of science delivery activities. 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

We provided a draft of this report to the Forest Service for comment. 
The Forest Service agreed with our findings and recommendations, and 
noted several actions that it intends to take to improve science 
delivery. In particular, the agency will begin to assess the 
effectiveness of its recent steps to improve science delivery and 
commit additional resources to strengthen science delivery; it will 
amend its guidance for, and update its training on, holding evaluation 
panels for research scientists so that science delivery receives more 
emphasis; and it will continue to recognize and provide incentives for 
science delivery activities. The agency noted, however, that its 
flexibility to modify its approach to these evaluation panels is 
limited because it must follow Office of Personnel Management 
regulations and policies. The Forest Service's written comments are 
reproduced in appendix IV. 

Unless you publicly announce the contents of this report earlier, we 
plan no further distribution until 30 days from the report date. At 
that time, we will send copies of this report to the appropriate 
congressional committees, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Chief of 
the Forest Service, and other interested parties. In addition, this 
report is available at no charge on the GAO Web site at [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov]. 

If you or your staff have questions about this report, please contact 
me at (202) 512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov. Contact points for our 
Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 
the last page of this report. Key contributors to this report are 
listed in appendix V. 

Sincerely yours, 

Signed by: 

Anu K. Mittal: 
Director, Natural Resources and Environment: 

[End of section] 

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology: 

Our objectives were to identify (1) the scope of research and 
development carried out by Forest Service Research and Development (FS 
R&D) and some of its resulting accomplishments; (2) trends in 
resources used in performing FS R&D work and the effects of those 
trends on its research efforts and priorities; and (3) recent steps FS 
R&D has taken to improve its ability to fulfill its mission, and 
challenges it faces in doing so. 

To obtain information on the scope of FS R&D's work and its 
accomplishments, we reviewed relevant laws, regulations, guidance, 
strategic plans, performance reviews, and historical documents and 
interviewed FS R&D officials at each of the seven research stations 
and the Washington Office. We visited five research stations in person 
(the Northern, Pacific Northwest, Pacific Southwest, Rocky Mountain, 
and Southern research stations) and interviewed officials from the 
other two research stations by telephone. Within each of the research 
stations, we interviewed a variety of officials, including the station 
directors, budget officers, human resource management officials, 
scientists, and others. At the Washington Office, we interviewed the 
Forest Service's Deputy Chief of Research and Development, the 
directors of FS R&D's four major science areas, and the acting and 
former National Science Application Team coordinators. To obtain 
stakeholders' views about FS R&D's activities and accomplishments, we 
conducted semistructured interviews of National Forest System and 
State and Private Forestry officials from the Washington Office and 
all nine Forest Service regions, including each Regional Forester or 
designee, as well as nonagency stakeholders representing a variety of 
interests such as industry, academia, and others. These stakeholders 
included the American Forest and Paper Association, the National 
Association of University Forest Resource Programs, the National 
Association of State Foresters, the National Woodland Owners 
Association, and others. 

To identify trends in resources used by FS R&D and the effects of 
those trends on research efforts and priorities, we obtained and 
analyzed spending and personnel data and interviewed scientists and 
officials at its research stations and the Washington Office. To 
identify spending trends for FS R&D, we obtained outlay data for 
fiscal years 2000 through 2009 from the Department of Agriculture's 
Foundation Financial Information System, including data on spending 
using both Forest Service appropriations and external funding. We 
analyzed these outlays by spending category (i.e., personnel, grants 
and agreements, training) for FS R&D as a whole and for each of the 
research stations and the Washington Office. To identify the sources 
of external support, as well as total external funding and the number 
of projects supported, we obtained and analyzed data from I-Web, a 
Forest Service database used to track agency agreements. Because I-Web 
was established in 2005, we were able to report detailed information 
about external support only for fiscal years 2005 through 2009. We 
analyzed outlay and external support data in both nominal (actual) and 
constant (adjusted for inflation) terms. Adjusting nominal dollars to 
constant dollars allows the comparison of purchasing power across 
fiscal years. To adjust for inflation, we used the gross domestic 
product price index with 2009 as the base year. To identify effects of 
resource trends on FS R&D's work, we interviewed scientists and 
officials at the research stations about these trends and how they 
have affected research efforts and priorities. To corroborate 
officials' statements about their hiring practices and staffing 
levels, we analyzed the Department of Agriculture's National Finance 
Center data on permanent, temporary, and term employees provided to us 
by the FS R&D Washington Office for fiscal years 2006 through 2009; 
data from previous fiscal years were not available for analysis. We 
assessed the reliability of the spending, funding, and personnel data 
we used in our report by reviewing the methods of data collection and 
entry for these databases and determined that the data were 
sufficiently reliable to use in this report. 

Finally, to identify steps FS R&D has taken to improve its ability to 
fulfill its mission and challenges it has faced in doing so, we 
reviewed relevant laws, regulations, guidance, strategic plans, 
performance measures, and recent research capacity and program 
assessments. We also relied on our interviews with FS R&D officials at 
the research stations and the Washington Office, and interviewed 
officials from the Forest Service's Chief Information Office to learn 
about FS R&D's computer and information technology challenges and what 
steps the office is taking to address them. In addition, during our 
interviews of National Forest System and State and Private Forestry 
officials and representatives from industry, state government, and 
nonfederal groups, we asked their views of the relevance of FS R&D 
work and what, in their opinion, could be done to improve it. To 
determine the extent to which FS R&D coordinates its work with other 
federal agencies to avoid unnecessary duplication of research, we also 
interviewed officials from other agencies that conduct research 
similar to that of FS R&D. To identify other federal agencies, we 
relied on the results of our interviews with FS R&D officials and 
stakeholders and reviewed National Science Foundation data to identify 
any additional agencies that conduct research and development similar 
to FS R&D that were not identified by the officials we interviewed. 
From our comprehensive list of federal agencies, we selected a 
nongeneralizable sample of five agencies: the Agricultural Research 
Service within the Department of Agriculture; the Office of Energy 
Efficiency and Renewable Energy within the Department of Energy; the 
Environmental Protection Agency; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
Administration within the Department of Commerce; and the U.S. 
Geological Survey within the Department of the Interior. We also 
reviewed results from the American Customer Satisfaction Index, the 
survey FS R&D uses to assess customer satisfaction. Although the 
response rate for this survey was limited, it is comparable to the 
rates obtained in surveys used to assess customer satisfaction with 
other agencies. 

We conducted this performance audit from October 2009 through October 
2010, in accordance with generally accepted government auditing 
standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit 
to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable 
basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 
We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for 
our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

[End of section] 

Appendix II: FS R&D Research Stations: 

The following seven figures depict and identify the mission, 
geographic coverage, research facility locations, and research subject 
areas of the seven FS R&D research stations. 

Figure 6: Northern Research Station: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To improve people’s lives and help sustain natural resources 
in the Northeast and Midwest through leading-edge science and 
effective information delivery. 

Northern Research Station research work units: 

* Biological and Environmental Influences on Forest Health and 
Productivity. 

* Center for Research on Ecosystem Change. 

* Climate, Fire, and Carbon Cycle Sciences. 

* Ecological and Economic Sustainability of the Appalachian Forest in 
an Era of Globalization. 

* Ecology and Management of Invasive Species and Forest Ecosystems. 

* Forest Inventory and Analysis. 

* Genetics, Biological Control, and Management of Invasive Species. 

* Hardwood Tree Improvement and Regeneration Center. 

* Institute for Applied Ecosystem Studies: Theory and Application of 
Scaling Science in Forestry. 

* Northern Science, Technology, and Applied Results Program 
(NorthSTAR). 

* People and Their Environments: Social Science Supporting Natural 
Resource Management and Policy. 

* Sustainable Management of Central Hardwood Ecosystems and Landscapes. 

* Sustaining Forests in a Changing Environment. 

* Urban Forests, Human Health, and Environmental Quality. 

Experimental forests (EF): 
Argonne EF, Wis.
Bartlett EF, N.H.
Big Falls EF, Minn.
Coulee EF, Wis.
Cutfoot Sioux EF, Minn.
Dukes EF, Mich.
Fernow EF, W.Va.
Hubbard Brook EF, N.H.
Kane EF, Pa.
Kaskaskia EF, Ill.
Kawishiwi EF, Minn.
Lower Peninsula EF, Mich.
Marcell EF, Minn.
Massabesic EF, Maine; 
Paoli EF, Ind.
Penobscot EF, Maine; 
Pike Bay EF, Minn.
Silas Little EF, N.J.
Sinkin EF, Mo.
Udell EF, Mich.
Vinton Furnace EF, Ohio. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Amherst, Mass.
Ansonia, Conn.
Baltimore, Md.
Burlington, Vt.
Columbia, Mo.
Delaware, Ohio; 
Durham, N.H.
East Lansing, Mich.
Evanston, Ill.
Grand Rapids, Minn.
Hamden, Conn.
Houghton, Mich.
Madison, Wis.
Morgantown, W.Va
Newtown Square, Pa.
New York City, N.Y.
Parsons, W.Va.
Princeton, W.Va
Rhinelander, Wis.
St. Paul, Minn.
Syracuse, N.Y.
Warren, Pa.
West Lafayette, Ind. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 7: Pacific Northwest Research Station: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To generate and communicate scientific knowledge that helps 
people understand and make informed choices about people, natural 
resources, and the environment. 

Pacific Northwest Research Station programs: 

* Ecological Process and Function. 

* Focused Science Delivery. 

* Goods, Services, and Values. 

* Land and Watershed Management. 

* Resource Monitoring and Assessment. 

* Threat Characterization and Management. 

Experimental forests (EF), ranges (ER), and research watersheds (RW): 
Bonanza Creek EF, Alaska; 
Caribou-Poker Creek RW, Alaska; 
Cascade Head EF, Oreg.
Entiat EF, Wash.
Heen Latinee EF, Alaska; 
H.J. Andrews EF, Oreg.
Maybeso EF, Alaska; 
Olympic Experimental State Forest EF, Wash.
Pringle Falls EF, Oreg.
South Umpqua EF, Oreg.
Starkey EF and ER, Oreg.
Wind River EF, Wash. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Anchorage, Alaska; 
Corvallis, Oreg.
Juneau, Alaska; 
La Grande, Oreg.
Olympia, Wash.
Portland, Oreg.
Prineville, Oreg.
Seattle, Wash.
Sitka, Alaska; 
Wenatchee, Wash. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 8: Pacific Southwest Research Station: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To develop and communicate science needed to sustain forest 
ecosystems and their benefits to society. 

Pacific Southwest Research Station research work units[A]: 

* Air Pollution and Global Change Impacts on Western Forest Ecosystems. 

* Center for Urban Forest Research. 

* Cumulative Effects of Forest Management on Hillslope Processes, 
Fishery Resources, and Downstream Environments. 

* Ecology and Management of Western Forests Influenced by 
Mediterranean Climate. 

* Institute of Forest Genetics. 

* Institute of Pacific Islands Forestry. 

* Maintaining Faunal Diversity in Forested Ecosystems of the Coastal 
and Intermountain West. 

* Prescribed Fire and Fire Effects. 

* Research Natural Areas. 

* Sierra Nevada Research Center. 

* Sudden Oak Death Research. 

* Wildland Fire Management Research, Development, and Application. 

* Wildland Recreation and Urban Cultures. 

[A] The Pacific Southwest Research Station was in the process of 
restructuring its research work units at the time of our review so the 
programs listed above depict the station’s organizational structure as 
of August 2010. 

Experimental forests (EF), ranges (ER), and watersheds (EW): 
Blacks Mountain EF, Calif.
Caspar Creek EW, Calif.
Challenge EF, Calif.
Hawaii Tropical EF, Hawaii; 
North Mountain EF, Calif.
Onion Creek EF, Calif.
Redwood EF, Calif.
Sagehen EF, Calif.
San Dimas EF, Calif.
San Joaquin ER, Calif
Stanislaus-Tuolumne EF, Calif.
Swain Mountain EF, Calif.
Teakettle EF, Calif. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Arcata, Calif.
Albany, Calif.
Davis, Calif.
Fresno, Calif.
Hilo, Hawaii; 
Placerville, Calif.
Redding, Calif.
Riverside, Calif. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 9: Rocky Mountain Research Station: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To develop and deliver scientific knowledge and technology 
that will help people sustain our forests, rangelands, and grasslands. 

Rocky Mountain Research Station programs: 

* Air, Water, and Aquatic Environments. 

* Fire, Fuel, and Smoke. 

* Forest and Woodland Ecosystems. 

* Grassland, Shrubland, and Desert Ecosystems. 

* Human Dimensions. 

* Inventory, Monitoring, and Analysis. 

* Wildlife and Terrestrial Ecosystems. 

Experimental forests (EF) and ranges (ER): 
Black Hills EF, S.Dak.
Boise Basin EF, Idaho; 
Coram EF, Mont.
Deception Creek EF, Idaho; 
Desert ER, Utah; 
Fort Valley EF, Ariz. 
Fraser EF, Colo.
Glacier Lakes Ecosystem Experiments Site, Wyo.
Great Basin ER, Utah; 
Long Valley EF, Ariz.
Manitou EF, Colo.
Priest River EF, Idaho; 
Sierra Ancha EF, Ariz.
Tenderfoot Creek EF, Mont. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Albuquerque, N.Mex.
Boise, Idaho; 
Bozeman, Mont.
Flagstaff, Ariz.
Fort Collins, Colo.
Logan, Utah; 
Missoula, Mont.
Moscow, Idaho
Ogden, Utah
Provo, Utah
Rapid City, S.Dak. 
Reno, Nev. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 10: Southern Research Station: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To create the science and technology needed to sustain and 
enhance southern forest ecosystems and the benefits they provide. 

Southern Research Station research work units: 

* Center for Bottomland Hardwoods Research. 

* Center for Forest Disturbance Science. 

* Center for Forest Watershed Research. 

* Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center. 

* Forest Economics and Policy. 

* Forest Genetics and Ecosystems Productivity. 

* Forest Inventory and Analysis. 

* Forest Operations. 

* Greatest Good for the 21st Century. 

* Insects, Diseases, and Invasive Plants of Southern Forests. 

* Integrating Human and Natural Systems in Urban and Urbanizing 
Environments. 

* National Agroforestry Center. 

* Restoring Longleaf Pine Ecosystems. 

* Southern Pine Ecology and Management. 

* Upland Hardwood Ecology and Management. 

* Utilization of Southern Forest Resources. 

Experimental forests (EF): 
Alum Creek EF, Ark.
Bent Creek EF, N.C.
Blue Valley EF, N.C.
Calhoun EF, S.C.
Chipola EF, Fla.
Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory, N.C.
Crossett EF, Ark.
Delta, Miss.
Escambia EF, Ala.
Harrison EF, Miss.
Henry R. Koen EF, Ark.
Hitchiti EF, Ga.
Olustee EF, Fla.
Palustris EF, La.
Santee EF, S.C.
Scull Shoals EF, Ga.
Stephen F. Austin EF, Tex.
Sylamore EF, Ark.
Tallahatchie EF, Miss. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations; 
Asheville, N.C.
Athens, Ga.
Auburn, Ala.
Blacksburg, Va.
Clemson, S.C.
Cordesville, S.C.
Gainesville, Fla.
Hot Springs, Ark.
Knoxville, Tenn.
Lincoln, Neb[A].
Monticello, Ark.
Nacogdoches, Tex.
New Ellenton, S.C.
Normal, Ala.
Otto, N.C.
Oxford, Miss.
Pineville, La.
Research Triangle Park, N.C.
Raleigh, N.C.
Saucier, Miss.
Starkville, Miss.
Stoneville, Miss. 

[A] The laboratory located in Lincoln, as depicted in fig. 9,
is managed by the Southern Research Station. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 11: Forest Products Laboratory: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To identify and conduct innovative wood and fiber utilization 
research that contributes to conservation and productivity of the 
forest resource, thereby sustaining forests, the economy, and quality 
of life. 

Forest Products Laboratory research work units: 

* Durability and Wood Protection Research. 

* Economics and Statistics Research. 

* Engineering Properties of Wood, Wood-based Materials, and Structures. 

* Engineered Composites Science. 

* Fiber and Chemical Sciences Research. 

* Institute for Microbial and Biochemical Sciences. 

* Performance Enhanced Biopolymers. 

Experimental forests: 
None. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Madison, Wis. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

Figure 12: The International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 

[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated map and accompanying data] 

Mission: To develop and disseminate scientifically derived knowledge 
that contributes to the sustainable use of forest resources; the 
rehabilitation of degraded lands; and the management and conservation 
of tropical forests, wildlife, and watersheds. 

International Institute of Tropical Forestry research work unit: 

* Tropical American Forest Management. 

Experimental forests (EF): 
Estate Thomas EF, U.S. Virgin Islands; 
Luquillo EF, Puerto Rico. 

Major FS R&D laboratory locations: 
Sabana at Luquillo, Puerto Rico; 
San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

Source: GAO and Forest Service. 

[End of figure] 

[End of section] 

Appendix III: Forest Service Research and Development Spending and 
Personnel Data, by Research Station: 

[End of section] 

This appendix provides data on FS R&D spending and personnel trends 
across the research stations. Table 2 shows yearly spending by the 
research stations. 

Table 2: Spending Using Forest Service Appropriations by Research 
Station, Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $22.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $22.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $22.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $27.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $30.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $28.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $23.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $41.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $37.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $39.5 million. 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $28.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $27.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $26.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $32.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $34.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $31.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $24.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $42.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $38.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $39.5 million. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 
Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $5.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $7.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $7.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $8.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $8.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $6.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $8.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $7.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $6.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $6.0 million. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 
Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $7.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $8.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $8.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $10 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $9.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $7.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $8.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $7.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $6.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $6.0 million. 

Research station: Northern: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $48.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $50.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $55.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $68.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $75.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $65.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $65.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $62.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $66.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $69.5 million. 

Research station: Northern: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $60.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $61.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $66.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $80.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $85.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $71.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $69.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $65.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $67.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $69.5 million. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $46.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $44.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $48.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $53.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $53.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $46.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $52.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $48.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $47.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $49.4 million. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $57.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $53.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $57.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $62.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $61.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $51.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $56.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $50.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $47.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $49.4 million. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $25.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $24.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $30.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $38.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $38.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $36.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $32.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $27.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $30.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $34.6 million. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $31.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $30.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $36.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $44.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $44.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $40.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $34.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $28.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $31.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $34.6 million. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $42.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $50.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $58.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $63.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $72.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $63.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $69.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $64.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $58.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $63.2v. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $52.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $61.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $70.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $74.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $82.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $69.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $74.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $67.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $59.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $63.2 million. 

Research station: Southern: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $62.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $49.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $56.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $66.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $69.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $58.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $64.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $63.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $62.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $61.2 million. 

Research station: Southern: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $77.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $60.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $67.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $77.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $79.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $65.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $69.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $65.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $63.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $61.2 million. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: Inflation-adjusted figures are in 2009 dollars. 

[End of table] 

Table 3 shows, for each research station, FS R&D spending using 
external funding from fiscal years 2000 through 2009, as well as the 
average annual change in funding during that period. 

Table 3: FS R&D Spending Using External Sources by Research Station, 
Fiscal Years 2000 through 2009: 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $2.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $1.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.8 million; 
Average annual change: 4.4%. 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $2.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $2.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $2.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $2.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.8 million; 
Average annual change: 1.9%. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 
Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $0.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $0.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $0.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $0.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.5 million; 
Average annual change: 7.1%. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 
Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.5 million; 
Average annual change: 4.6%. 

Research station: Northern: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $2.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $2.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $2.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $2.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $3.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $2.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $2.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.2 million; 
Average annual change: 13.4%. 

Research station: Northern: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $0.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $0.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $3.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $3.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $3.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $2.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $3.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $2.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $2.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.2 million; 
Average annual change: 10.7%. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $3.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $2.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $3.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $4.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $4.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $5.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $5.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $3.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $3.1 million; 
Average annual change: -1.9%. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $4.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $2.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $3.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $3.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $5.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $5.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $5.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $5.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $3.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $3.1 million; 
Average annual change: -4.2%. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $0.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.1 million; 
Average annual change: 9.0%. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $1.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $1.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $0.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $2.1 million; 
Average annual change: 6.4%. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $6.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $10.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $13.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $16.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $15.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $17.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $21.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $22.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $19.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $18.8 million; 
Average annual change: 13.0%. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $7.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $12.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $16.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $18.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $17.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $18.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $23.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $22.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $20.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $18.8 million; 
Average annual change: 10.3%. 

Research station: Southern: Nominal; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $1.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $2.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $2.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.5 million; 
Average annual change: 2.9%. 

Research station: Southern: Inflation-adjusted; 
Fiscal years: 2000: $1.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2001: $2.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2002: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2003: $2.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2004: $2.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $2.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.5 million; 
Average annual change: 0.5%. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

Note: Inflation-adjusted figures are in 2009 dollars. 

[End of table] 

Table 4 shows the amount of external funding provided to FS R&D from 
fiscal years 2005 through 2009, by source. Because other federal 
agencies provide the majority of external support to FS R&D, their 
contributions are shown by agency. 

Table 4: Number of Projects Supported by, and Amount of, External 
Funding Provided to FS R&D, by Funding Source, Fiscal Years 2005 
through 2009: 

External source: 

Federal: 

Department of Agriculture: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 15; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 17; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 19; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 16; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 13. 

Department of Agriculture: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $2.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.8 million. 

Department of Commerce: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 1; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 2; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 3. 

Department of Commerce: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.0; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.2 million. 

Department of Defense: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 12; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 40; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 33; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 34; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 35. 

Federal: Department of Defense: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $9.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $22.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $16.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $15.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $15.0 million. 

Department of Energy: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 6; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 8. 

Department of Energy: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.3 million. 

Department of the Interior: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 27; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 43; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 53; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 52; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 40. 

Department of the Interior: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $5.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $4.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $4.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $6.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $5.1 million. 

Environmental Protection Agency: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 4; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 7; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 4; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 3. 

Environmental Protection Agency: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.2 million. 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 1; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 6; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 8. 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.5 million. 

Other federal[A]: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 2; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 2; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 2; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 2. 

Other federal[A]: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.0; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.0; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.0; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.2 million. 

Subtotal federal (number of projects): 
Fiscal years: 2005: 68; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 122; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 126; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 121; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 112. 

Subtotal federal (funding amount): 
Fiscal years: 2005: $19.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $30.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $25.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $25.9 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $24.2 million. 

Nonfederal: 

Foreign: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 6; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 3; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 5; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 3. 

Foreign: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.3 million. 

Industry: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 19; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 42; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 46; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 30; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 29. 

Industry: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.6 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $2.5 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.1 million. 

Nonprofit organizations: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 27; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 12; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 24; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 22; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 21. 

Nonprofit organizations: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $4.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.7 million. 

States: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 16; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 18; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 19; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 22; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 26. 

States: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $3.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $1.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $1.7 million. 

Universities: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 15; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 26; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 29; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 22; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 21. 

Universities: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $1.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.7 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.7 million. 

Other nonfederal[B]: Projects; 
Fiscal years: 2005: 6; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 7; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 11; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 8; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 5. 

Other nonfederal[B]: Funding; 
Fiscal years: 2005: $0.2 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $0.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $0.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $0.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $0.3 million. 

Subtotal nonfederal (number of projects): 
Fiscal years: 2005: 88; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 111; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 132; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 109; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 105. 

Subtotal nonfederal (funding amount): 
Fiscal years: 2005: $7.1 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $6.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $5.3 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $6.0 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $4.8 million. 

Total (number of projects): 
Fiscal years: 2005: 156; 
Fiscal years: 2006: 233; 
Fiscal years: 2007: 258; 
Fiscal years: 2008: 230; 
Fiscal years: 2009: 217. 

Total (funding amount): 
Fiscal years: 2005: $26.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2006: $37.4 million; 
Fiscal years: 2007: $30.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2008: $31.8 million; 
Fiscal years: 2009: $29.1 million. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

[A] According to Forest Service data, other federal sources of 
external funding include the U.S. Access Board, the Department of 
Health and Human Services, the Department of Homeland Security, the 
U.S. Postal Service, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Department of 
Transportation, the Valles Caldera Trust, and the Department of 
Veterans Affairs. 

[B] Other nonfederal sources of external funding include cities, 
counties, tribes, local governments, and unidentified sources. 

[End of table] 

Table 5 shows the number of FS R&D employees by employee type-- 
permanent, term, and temporary--for each research station during 
fiscal years 2006 through 2009. 

Table 53: Number of FS R&D Employees by Research Station, Fiscal Years 
2006 through 2009: 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 195; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 181; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 175; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 176; 
Average annual change: -3.4%. 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 8; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 5; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 3; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 2; 
Average annual change: -37.0%. 

Research station: Forest Products Laboratory: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 14; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 12; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 11; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 16; 
Average annual change: 4.6%. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: 
Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 44; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 42; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 41; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 45; 
Average annual change: 0.8%. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical Forestry: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 2; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 0; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 1; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 1; 
Average annual change: -20.6%. 

Research station: International Institute of Tropical 
Forestry:Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 6; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 6; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 8; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 9; 
Average annual change: 14.5%. 

Research station: Northern: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 452; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 438; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 424; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 420; 
Average annual change: -2.4%. 

Research station: Northern: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 58; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 59; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 45; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 29; 
Average annual change: -20.6%. 

Research station: Northern: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 93; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 90; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 100; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 96; 
Average annual change: 1.1%. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 297; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 300; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 285; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 299; 
Average annual change: 0.2%. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 67; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 49; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 29; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 23; 
Average annual change: -30.0%. 

Research station: Pacific Northwest: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 98; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 82; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 85; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 78; 
Average annual change: -7.3%. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 181; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 175; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 162; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 155; 
Average annual change: -5.0%. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 47; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 40; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 33; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 42; 
Average annual change: -3.7%. 

Research station: Pacific Southwest: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 107; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 88; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 111; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 140; 
Average annual change: 9.4%. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 406; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 391; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 381; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 373; 
Average annual change: -2.8%. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 85; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 72; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 63; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 48; 
Average annual change: -17.3%. 

Research station: Rocky Mountain: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 124; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 127; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 112; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 164; 
Average annual change: 9.8%. 

Research station: Southern: Permanent; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 424; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 430; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 403; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 407; 
Average annual change: -1.4%. 

Research station: Southern: Term; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 35; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 30; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 24; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 19; 
Average annual change: -18.4%. 

Research station: Southern: Temporary; 
Fiscal year: 2006: 113; 
Fiscal year: 2007: 94; 
Fiscal year: 2008: 90; 
Fiscal year: 2009: 74; 
Average annual change: -13.2%. 

Source: GAO analysis of Forest Service data. 

[End of table] 

[End of section] 

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Agriculture, Forest 
Service: 

USDA: 
United States Department of Agriculture: 
Forest Service: 
Washington Office: 
1400 Independence Avenue, SW: 
Washington, DC 20250: 

File Code: 1420: 

Date: October 12 2010: 

Anu K. Mittal: 
Director, Natural Resources and Environment: 
U.S. Government Accountability Office: 
441 G. Street, N.W. 
Washington, DC 20548: 

Dear Ms. Mittal: 

Thank you for the opportunity to review and provide comment on the 
draft Government Accountability Office (GAO) Report entitled, "Forest 
Service Research & Development (R&D), Improvements in Delivery of 
Research Results Can Help Ensure that Benefits or Research Are 
Realized" (GAO-11-12). The report first recommended the Forest Service 
R&D assess the effectiveness of recent steps taken to improve science 
delivery from Forest Service R&D to land managers and other 
stakeholders. This includes the extent to which steps taken have 
helped ensure Forest Service R&D's work is disseminated beyond the 
agency. Moreover, it recommended we communicate more effectively with 
a broad range of potential stakeholders, including considering 
recommendations of the Forest Service's 2009 science delivery report. 
Secondly the report recommended we take steps to ensure individual 
performance assessments better balance various types of science 
delivery activities. 

The Forest Service has reviewed the report and concurs with the 
report's observations and recommendations. The agency's comments on 
the two recommendations are as follows: 

1. We will begin to assess the effectiveness of recent steps taken to 
improve science delivery, including considering recommendations make 
in the 2009 report on science delivery. We will also be committing 
additional resources to strengthen science delivery. 

2. This specific finding was based on feedback from officials and 
users that R&D places greater emphasis on peer-reviewed journals as a 
means of science delivery than on other types of science delivery 
efforts, such as workshops, that are often more useful to end users. 
Forest Service R&D has various flexibilities within its authority to 
better focus the individual assessment process to improve science 
delivery, including: a. Revising the internal Forest Service policy 
for Preparing Research Scientist Position Descriptions and Conducting 
Research Grade Evaluation Panels (dated 7/3/08). We will amend 
guidance to better emphasize other forms of science delivery and will 
add a seventh type of research accomplishment called science delivery; 
b. Updating current internal training on the research panel process to 
include more emphasis on technology transfer and science delivery by 
providing several examples of ways to consider and evaluate all types 
of science delivery; c. Continuing to recognize and provide incentives 
to scientists for science delivery through awards and performance 
bonuses for outstanding examples of science delivery. 

However, there are certain factors within the research assessment 
process which we are required to follow by law, regulation, and 
federal government-wide policy, specifically Office of Personnel 
Management (OPM) requirements that federal scientists be evaluated 
against their classification standards, i.e., the Research Grade 
Evaluation Guide dated September 2006. While we can modify our 
internal guidance for conducting and evaluating Research Scientists, 
we are obligated to use and follow OPM's regulations and policies that 
apply to all federal Research Scientists. 

If you have any questions, please contact Donna M. Carmical, Chief 
Financial Officer, at 202-205-1321 ordcarmical@fs.fed.us. 

Sincerely, 

Signed by: 

Illegible, for: 

Thomas L. Tidwell: 
Chief: 

cc: Daina Apple, Angela Coleman, Sandy T. Coleman, Jennifer McGuire, 
Donna M. Carmical. 

[End of section] 

Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

GAO Contact: 

Anu K. Mittal, 202-512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov: 

Staff Acknowledgments: 

In addition to the individual named above, Steve Gaty, Assistant 
Director; Ulana Bihun; Ellen W. Chu; Carol Henn; Richard P. Johnson; 
Paul Kazemersky; Lesley Rinner; Kelly Rubin; Jacqueline Wade; Tama 
Weinberg; and Melissa Wolf made key contributions to this report. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] The Forest Service's other main programs are the National Forest 
System and the State and Private Forestry program. The National Forest 
System manages the nation's 193 million acres of national forest and 
grassland, while State and Private Forestry is responsible for 
providing technical and financial assistance to states, tribes, 
communities, and private landowners. Some research and development 
activities are carried out by these programs, but the majority of such 
activities are carried out by FS R&D, whose work is the focus of this 
report. 

[2] For purposes of this report, we used outlay data--that is, data on 
obligations that have been, or are in the process of being, paid--to 
measure spending. 

[3] We did not use staffing data for fiscal years 2000 through 2005 
because the data contained coding errors that made them unreliable for 
our purposes. 

[4] We adjusted nominal dollars using the gross domestic product price 
index, with 2009 as the base year. The purpose of showing dollars in 
inflation-adjusted terms is to permit comparisons of purchasing power. 

[5] In addition to its role as a research station under FS R&D, the 
International Institute of Tropical Forestry also manages activities 
within the Forest Service's State and Private Forestry and 
International Programs areas. 

[6] Although the name "research station" is officially used only for 
the five geographically based stations, for purposes of this report, 
we refer to all seven of these entities--including the Forest Products 
Laboratory and the International Institute of Tropical Forestry--as 
research stations. 

[7] Pub.L. No. 95-307, as amended, 92 Stat. 353 (1978). This act 
repealed the McSweeney-McNary Forest Research Act of 1928, ch. 678, 45 
Stat. 699-702, as amended. 

[8] Nanotechnology is the ability to control matter at the scale of a 
nanometer, equal to one-billionth of a meter. 

[9] Appropriations may also be accompanied by congressional committee 
direction to use a portion of the funds for specific issues. For 
example, the conference report accompanying the Department of the 
Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010, 
directed FS R&D to, among other things, use $800,000 of the agency's 
appropriation for the Center for Bottomlands Hardwood Research in 
Mississippi. (H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 111-316 at 132 (2009).) In general, 
committee report language is not legally binding, but agencies may 
decide to follow such language for practical reasons. See Lincoln v. 
Vigil, 508 U.S. 182, 193 (1993). 

[10] We relied on our interviews with stakeholders to identify FS 
R&D's primary accomplishments and areas of research that may need 
greater attention. Appendix I lists the stakeholders interviewed. 

[11] The Agricultural Research, Extension, and Education Reform Act of 
1998 mandated that the Forest Service partner with states and other 
groups to implement an annual inventory in all states and to develop a 
report for each state every 5 years. 

[12] Pub. L. No. 110-234, § 8002, 122 Stat. 1280 (2008). 

[13] For more information on the emerald ash borer, see GAO, Invasive 
Forest Pests: Lessons Learned from Three Recent Infestations May Aid 
in Managing Future Efforts, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-353] (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 21, 
2006). 

[14] Other partners include the Southern Region of the National Forest 
System, the American Chestnut Foundation, and the University of 
Tennessee's Tree Improvement Program. 

[15] We measured the change in spending from fiscal years 2000 through 
2009 using the compound annual rate of growth. 

[16] This spending is primarily from the Forest and Rangeland Research 
appropriation account but also includes spending from other Forest 
Service accounts that support FS R&D activities, including Capital 
Improvement and Maintenance, and others. 

[17] The enacted budget authority for forest and rangeland research in 
a given year does not necessarily equal FS R&D spending for that year, 
in part because the Forest Service has the ability to carry over 
forest and rangeland research funds from one fiscal year to spend them 
in other fiscal years and because FS R&D can spend from other Forest 
Service accounts that support research activities. 

[18] FS R&D moved to a new database in 2005, and data from the 
previous database were not available for fiscal years 2000 through 
2004 at the same level of detail as for fiscal years 2005 through 2009. 

[19] Temporary employees are limited to working 6 months or less per 
year, while term employees are hired generally full-time for a period 
of 1 to 4 years. 

[20] Data before 2006 were not sufficiently reliable for our purposes 
and are therefore not included in our trend analysis. 

[21] We are assessing this centralization effort and expect to issue a 
report in 2011. 

[22] Research scientists are those scientists reviewed under standard 
Office of Personnel Management criteria, known as a "research grade 
evaluation guide," every 3 to 5 years to determine grade 
classification and promotion. 

[23] As a result of our review, according to a senior official, FS R&D 
is verifying the number of research scientists to ensure that they are 
accurately reported. The figures we report come from a centralized 
database, which may slightly over-or undercount this category of 
scientists. FS R&D officials are currently comparing research station 
records with the centralized database to correct any inconsistencies. 

[24] The station recently began to coordinate its efforts with those 
of the Southwest Ecological Restoration Institutes, which include 
Northern Arizona, Colorado State, and New Mexico Highlands 
universities. The institutes were established to help support land 
managers in implementing ecological restoration treatments, in part by 
transferring relevant and accurate scientific information to managers 
and other key stakeholders. 

[25] 16 U.S.C. § 2107(c). 

[26] U.S. Forest Service, Final Report: Assessment of Technology 
Transfer within the USDA Forest Service (Washington, D.C., 2009). As 
stated in the report, the purpose of this assessment was to improve 
the effectiveness and efficiency of science delivery to users of 
Forest Service information, science applications, technology, and 
delivery mechanisms. 

[27] FS R&D uses the American Customer Satisfaction Index, developed 
by the National Quality Research Center at the University of Michigan, 
for its surveys. 

[28] Overall customer satisfaction varied by program area from 72 to 
79 and by research station, from 69 to 83. 

[29] These three categories are part of the research and development 
investment criteria for federal program evaluation, a set of 
guidelines for assessing the performance of federal research agencies. 
The criteria were initially articulated to the heads of federal 
departments and agencies by the Office of Management and Budget and 
the Office of Science and Technology Policy in 2002. 

[30] See, for example, U.S. Forest Service, Forest Service Research 
and Development, Fiscal Year 2008, FS-944 (Washington, D.C., 2010), 
and U.S. Forest Service, USDA Forest Service Research and Development 
2008-2009 Highlights, FS-942 (Washington, D.C., 2009). The Performance 
and Accountability Report is a year-end progress report reviewing FS 
R&D's performance in relation to the Forest Service's strategic goals 
and objectives. The 2008-2009 Highlights Report describes selected 
accomplishments by research area. 

[31] We previously reported on the creation of the Rocky Mountain 
Research Station; see GAO, Forest Service: Consolidation of the Rocky 
Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station With the Intermountain 
Research Station, [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/01-53R] 
(Washington, D.C.: Nov. 16, 2000). 

[32] The Northern and Southern research stations and the Forest 
Products Laboratory have shifted their organizational structure to 
broader areas but continue to call these areas research work units, 
rather than programs. The Pacific Southwest Research Station plans to 
complete its shift from research work units to programs in the fall of 
2010. The International Institute of Tropical Forestry has only one 
unit, Tropical American Forest Management, which has not been 
restructured; the institute continues to call this entity a research 
work unit. 

[33] FS R&D officials told us the resource center will be expanding to 
include information provided by the Northern and Southern research 
stations as well. 

[34] Agenda 2020 Technology Alliance and Energetics Incorporated, 
Forest Products Industry Technology Roadmap, a report sponsored by the 
American Forest and Paper Association and the Department of Energy, 
July 26, 2006. 

[35] Traditional wood preservatives, used in pressure-treated wood 
since the 1940s, helped prevent wood rot due to insects and microbes. 
Such wood preservatives, however, contained the toxic metals arsenic, 
chromium, and copper, and pressure-treated wood containing the 
preservatives is no longer being produced for use in most residential 
settings. 

[36] Terrestrial carbon sequestration is defined as either the net 
removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or the prevention of 
carbon dioxide net emissions from terrestrial ecosystems, such as 
forests and agricultural lands, into the atmosphere. Carbon 
sequestration also occurs in the oceans. 

[37] The Great Basin desert ecoregion covers most of Nevada and parts 
of Oregon, Idaho, Utah, and California. 

[38] The Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects plant and animal 
species that are either facing extinction (endangered species) or 
likely to face extinction (threatened species) and protects the 
ecosystems on which they depend. 

[39] 44 U.S.C. § 3507. The purpose of the act is to (1) minimize the 
federal paperwork burden for individuals, small businesses, state and 
local governments, and other persons; (2) minimize the cost to the 
federal government of collecting, maintaining, using, and 
disseminating information; and (3) maximize the usefulness of 
information collected by the federal government. 

[40] We have previously reported on the limitations associated with 
this requirement. See, for example, GAO, Paperwork Reduction Act: New 
Approaches Can Strengthen Information Collection and Reduce Burden, 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-477T] (Washington, 
D.C.: Mar. 8, 2006). 

[41] Transferring funds between appropriations accounts (such as those 
funding National Science Foundation and Forest Service activities, 
respectively) is prohibited absent specific statutory authority. 31 
U.S.C. § 1532. The law is one aspect of congressional "power of the 
purse"--the power of Congress to appropriate funds and to prescribe 
the conditions governing the use of those funds. See GAO, Principles 
of Federal Appropriations Law, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-04-261SP] (Washington, D.C.: January 
2004), 1-3. 

[End of section] 

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