Herb Hammond is a Registered Professional Forester and forest ecologist with 40 years of experience in research, industry, teaching and consulting. Currently his work is carried out through Silva Ecosystem Consultants and the Silva Forest Foundation. He is best known for his concept and application of nature-based planning, which he formerly referred to as ecosystem-based conservation planning. Hammond defines nature-based planning as the protection and ecologically responsible use of ecosystems through all scales of time and space. Working primarily with Indigenous Nations and other rural communities, Hammond has developed more than 25 ecosystem-based conservation plans across Canada and in other parts of the world.
Hammond holds a Bachelor of Science in forest management from Oregon State University and a Masters of Forestry from the University of Washington. He is the author of Seeing the Forest Among the Trees: The Case for Wholistic Forest Use (Polestar Press), which won the Roderick-Haig Brown B.C. Book Prize in 1992, and Maintaining Whole Systems on Earth’s Crown: Ecosystem-based Conservation Planning for the Boreal Forest (Silva Forest Foundation).
He is currently working with two others on a book to be published by UBC Press on applying nature-based planning/ecosystem-based conservation planning to restore urban areas. The book’s working title is: Inviting Nature Home: An Ecosystem-based Approach to Cities. Herb is also working on a book about Nature and our place in her complex fabric. This book describes a new reality that is necessary for our survival, and how to get there in the face of the climate emergency.