In light of observations of climate changes over the past century, understanding the climate of the past millennium becomes increasingly important. This enables us placing the changes we witness today in a longer-term context, helping us deciphering both natural and anthropogenic forcing on the climate system.

In this context, the project "Forest response to climate change predicted from multicentury climate proxy-records in the Carpathian region" (CLIMFOR) will answer one of the most critical questions in climate research: does the magnitude and rate of the 20th century climate change exceed the natural variability in the Carpathian region? Building on this, the project will also answer a second question, of direct importance for future forest management in a changing climate: how did forests respond to past climatic changes of variable magnitude and frequency?