Decomposing the drivers of forest carbon sink changes from the perspective of digital input: Balancing timber utilization and ecological conservation

The conservation-utilization conflict between carbon sinks and timber production in forest resource use remains the central constraint on sustainable forestry, while the expanding adoption of digital technologies offers new opportunities to address this challenge. Against this backdrop, this study evaluates carbon sinks and timber production across 31 provinces in China from 2012 to 2022. This study first employs a non-radial directional distance function (NDDF) under an overall technology framework to develop a dynamic time-series classification of forestry development modes. It then introduces a “digital input utilization” indicator to measure the utilization of digital input in the two forestry outputs. Finally, digital input is integrated into a decomposition framework for carbon-sink growth to systematically determine how various factors drive changes in carbon sinks. The results indicate that: (1) Temporally, China's forestry can be categorized into three modes: win-win development, carbon-sink improvement and timber-production improvement. Observed changes in forest carbon sinks within regions corresponding to each mode closely match the characteristics of that mode. (2) The utilization of digital inputs in the two forestry outputs differs significantly across development modes, often contradicting the characteristics of their corresponding modes. (3) The dominant drivers of carbon-sink growth vary across modes, and the marginal contribution of digital inputs to enhancing the coordination between carbon sinks and timber production exhibits diminishing returns. Overall, this study enhances understanding of how digital investments influence sustainable forestry outcomes and offers guidance for developing differentiated forestry policies.