How Does Stewardship Contracting Benefit Local Communities? A Social and Economic Assessment

Abstract This study provides the first national-level examination of the USDA Forest Service’s use of the stewardship contracting mechanism. We situate local economic benefits within the context of long-standing Forest Service priorities for supporting local community well-being and offer an empirical definition of local versus non-local contractor place of business. We created statistical models to estimate the geographic distribution of the economic benefits of stewardship contracting relative to community development needs. We find that from 2014 to 2023, when compared to conventional timber sales, stewardship contracts were associated with higher timber sale volumes but were only weakly associated with businesses based in “local” communities. However, integrated resource service contracts were strongly associated with businesses based in communities with higher development needs. We suggest methodological directions for future research on the local economic contributions of Forest Service contracting policies.