Intelligent solutions and tools in forest production systems, fostering a sustainable supply of quality wood for the growing bioeconomy

Topic description

Specific Challenge:

Increasing societal demands and emerging policies relating to forest resources present new challenges for the sector and trigger the need to enhance the multi-functional role of forests in the EU. The quantity and the quality of wood yields depend on site conditions, forest management objectives, silvicultural regime and measures taken from the establishment of forest stands to the end of rotation (for even-aged forests) or the selection harvest (for uneven-aged forests). Managing forests' horizontal and vertical structure is crucially important given the long production cycles involved and the demand to adapt, within the production cycle, to the evolving framework of environmental and societal conditions. It is therefore desirable to develop intelligent (i.e. cost-efficient, productive and environment-friendly) and novel solutions and tools to support sustainable wood production from forests managed on a multifunctional basis.

To add value to wood production and enable close-to-market outputs, proposals should aim to develop a series of cutting edge technologies in relation to forestry measures starting from seedling/replanting, through to harvesting. Activities should aim directly at producing plans and arrangements or designs for new, altered or improved products, processes or services. For this purpose they may include prototyping, testing, demonstrating, piloting, large-scale product validation and market replication. SMEs active in the forest-based sector are specifically encouraged to participate in consortia.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of up to EUR 2 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude the submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

With a view to enhancing the multifunctional role of forests, proposals should show how some, or all, of the following impacts will be achieved:

• Improved tools for sustainable forest management decisions and operations in primary production systems, marketable within a period of up to three years from the approval, entailing higher efficiency in operation;
• Lower environmental impact of forest management and harvesting operations, in order to preserve forests' capacity to provide for non-wood forest products and essential ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, water regulation, soil and nutrient regulation, and recreation;
• Sustainable supply of quality wood for the growth of forestry enterprises in the bioeconomy and the creation of new jobs in SMEs..