Sustainability in Forestry

The eco-building movement has long recognised timber as one of the most important of renewable building materials. Renewable it may be, but just how sustainable is our usage of timber? At the beginning of a new century the forestry industry is facing a crisis which has been building over many decades – news-broadcasts confront us with images of forest fires on a regional scale, destroying communities and hastening climate change. Around half of the worlds original forest cover has been destroyed, largely during the latter half of the 20th Century. Perhaps unfortunately, the forest industry is heavily linked with this forest destruction, even though a large proportion of the clearance is for other purposes, such as subsistence agriculture and beef ranching.
Around 1.6 billion cubic metres of timber are currently harvested annually, and realistic estimates expect this to rise to 2.5 billion cubic metres by 2050. Can this level of extraction be sustained? Well, perhaps surprisingly, current research suggests that with responsible forest management a major crisis can be averted. Read on….

Current Usage
Of the 1.6 billion cubic metres of wood currently harvested, well over a quarter of this is used by the USA. This may sound extravagant, and it probably is, but the USA is also the largest timber producer, making them almost self-sufficient in timber from their own forests (more than can be said for the UK). Unfortunately a proportion of this is still extracted from old growth forests near the west-coast. Thankfully, on a per-capita basis, the rest of the world has a timber consumption far less than the average American – an American uses 15 times that of a Chinaman.
When we think of forests in crisis it is often in response to problems of extraction from tropical regions. Surprisingly, the harvest from Brazil is less than a quarter of that from USA. Indonesia and Malaya together harvest about as much as Brazil. This fact would seem to point the finger at North-America for their high harvesting rates. The difference is that a large proportion of North-American production is now from plantations – forests in the USA were massively replanted at the end of the 19th Century when they realised how little they had left after their initial colonisation of the country. Added to this, the area under forest in North-America and Europe is currently on the increase, whereas tropical forests are still declining.
Results of a recent analysis undertaken for the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) shows that our current timber usage amounts to the productivity of around 20% of the world’s forests. This means that, in an ideal world, 80% of the worlds forest cover could remain untouched, assuming that the current area of forest cover can be maintained. In theory, even the increased supply required by 2050 could be sustainably extracted from around a quarter of the world’s forests, perhaps allowing us some cause for hope for the future.

Current Threats
Overall deforestation continues – of a world forest cover of 600 million hectares, some 9 million hectares are lost each year. The decline is actually greater than this in tropical forests, but is partly offset by planting in the northern-hemisphere. Illegal logging also continues on a massive scale, and forest fires are having an enormous impact, destroying tens of millions of hectares in the later 1990’s. In Indonesia alone, 14 million hectares of forest and scrub were lost in 1997/98, leading to serious economic and health costs to around 70 million people. This burning is mostly deliberate, the main objective being a massive spread of oil palm plantations, implicating the greed of the processed food industry.
Fires are not restricted to Southeast Asia; around 2.7 million hectares of forest were lost to fire in the USA in 2000.

Forest Management
In general it is not currently known how well the worlds forests are managed. We do know that many forests in developed countries are very well managed, delivering multiple economic and environmental benefits. We also know that illegal logging is widespread, and forest conversion to other uses contributes considerably to timber supply in many regions, but this can hardly be described as forest management. On the plus side, over two-thirds of the world’s wood is produced by OECD member countries where the rule of law generally applies. Added to this, many developing countries are managing to improve their forestry practises, often having the protective legislation in place, but perhaps falling a little short on enforcement. All this suggests that a significant proportion of global timber harvests come from ‘managed’ sources, although the quality of management can be highly variable. But, at least we can say that a significant proportion of production is from forests which are within reach of the ideal standard for responsible forestry. If the necessary improvements can be made to achieve sound management in these areas, then perhaps bad forestry can be squeezed out of the system as consumers and investors demand increased environmental performance, simultaneously making life harder for illegal operators.

Improving Efficiency
The proportion of timber production coming from fast growing plantations (planting to harvesting less than 50 years) is rapidly increasing, currently producing 20% of requirements from 50 million hectares of plantation (only 0.33% of the worlds land area). These plantations produce timber at 5 to 10 times the average forest yield. It is expected that this type of plantation will be supplying around half of the worldwide wood demand within the next 30 years, and the proportion will still be on the increase. Many of the older plantations are poorly established and have replaced natural forest, with all that implies for loss of biodiversity, but we are now seeing plantation establishment to new and higher standards, contributing considerably to future timber and fibre demands while minimising environmental impact.
Improved silviculture in existing forests is also improving forestry efficiency, with ‘low impact’ logging making its way into many forests in the tropics and elsewhere. Better mapping and planning pre-harvest, and less wasteful post-harvest treatments are all helping. These improved practises have demonstrated their worth, with damage to the remaining forest reduced by half, and productivity increased by 20% leading to increased profitability.
More efficient wood conversion also helps to reduce impact on forests. Sawmills in the US and Europe can produce 70% of saleable wood from each log, and residual chips are used for particleboard. By contrast, the current figure in developing countries is nearer to 30%, with very little use of chips. If by transfer of technology we can double this efficiency figure, then only half the number of logs need be extracted.
The paper industry has also improved its efficiency, producing more paper from less wood.

Independent Certification
WWF believes independent certification is the answer to recognising good forest management and extending good practises to a greater area of forest. For this purpose they were instrumental in setting up the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), providing a framework for standard setting and auditing to be applied worldwide. FSC accreditation currently extends to 2 – 3% of production forests (20 million hectares in 35 countries). Most operators who have had to modify forest practises to achieve certification have since reaped social and economic benefits.
Studies show that the scale of the challenge of extending certification is manageable given appropriate leadership from industry and the green movement. The biggest producers and users have been identified, and many of these are already making moves in the right direction. There are now around 700 companies in the Global Forest and Trade Network committed to producing, trading or purchasing forest products certified as sustainably produced. This applies pressure to the remaining slightly more reticent companies to clean up their act or lose out as consumers spend elsewhere. If a proportion of the largest companies are brought on board, either producing or using only certified timber, then a critical mass will be created for the take off of certification.

Acknowledgements
The afforegoing is largely based on research commissioned by WWF and published in a booklet entitled ‘The Forest Industry in the 21st Century’ as part of their Forests for Life campaign.