Seeing the wood from the trees
29 November 2012It was the government’s worst nightmare. Dealing with obstreperous opponents in the Commons and the slings and arrows of prime minister’s questions was one thing. Facing the antagonism of the mass ranks of steely-eyed middle England was something else entirely. This was opposition of a different magnitude – and it was, of course, what ministers faced over their idea to sell off the Forestry Commission’s English woodlands.
The proposal hit a nerve deep in the English psyche where lurked intense feelings about common access to 'our forests', and the anti movement brought together everyone from the waxed jacket and wellies brigade, to suburbanites. This government consequently did what any would do. It performed such a swift U-turn you could smell burning rubber.
In fact, it went further than this. It set up a panel of the great and the good, led by a Bishop, to look at all aspects of English woodlands for the future.
As Confor's recent conference on the topic highlighted, the potentially huge positive outcome of all this for the timber sector is that the panel did not just look at forests as an environmental resource and a place for walking dogs and mountain biking. A core focus was the sustainable commercial exploitation of trees for timber, and other wood products, with the aim of creating jobs, boosting rural economies, increasing the use of home-grown material and providing long-term financial incentives to maintain tree cover.
One of the 31 final recommendations of the panel, which the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra) is now mulling over, is the launch of a Wood Industry Action Plan. A panel member said this would "create a culture in which wood as a material and fuel is valued and sought after". It could also raise the profile of forestry careers and "tell the story of wood". The end result would be "better skills and more timber to market".
Another proposal was to increase forest cover from 10% to 15% of England's land area.
Confor chief executive Stuart Goodall backed the panel's conclusions and also urged that the action plan include bringing 600,000ha of under-utilised woodlands back into commercial management.
It all sounds resoundingly positive, but the rub now is how many and how much of the forestry panel's recommendations will be implemented by government. And there are already hints that the pressure on ministers needs to be maintained, with a cagey Defra representative at the conference saying that the target for increasing tree cover would be a huge logistical challenge and cost up to £6.5bn.
There's a growing feeling that it is not just in the domestic timber sector's interests to lobby for the panel's conclusions to be adopted. By underlining the worth of commercial management of woodlands, not just in terms of generating tax revenues and creating jobs, but in helping maintain and grow the resource, they could enhance public perception of wood generally and potentially benefit the entire sector.
Combine this with growing international efforts, backed solidly by the industry, to combat the illegal timber trade, with the Australians just passing their Illegal Logging Prohibition Bill and, of course, the EU Timber Regulation coming into force in March, and we could have a double marketing hook, highlighting the timber sector's wider environmental value and commitment and the robustness and potential of domestic timber production. Strong stuff for Wood for Good and its Wood First campaign to add to the locker.
