A new organisation has been established in Ireland to develop a market for homegrown hardwoods and bring together forest owners, timber growers and hardwood users.
The creation of the Irish Hardwood Council (IHC) was announced at a recent conference – Managing our Broadleaf Resource to Produce Quality Hardwood Timber – organised by COFORD, the National Council for Forest Research and Development.
COFORD operations manager Joe O’Carroll said Ireland currently imports more than E100m of hardwood timber per year. This is in addition to the millions of euros spent annually on imported hardwood window frames, doors, veneers and furniture.
And he said more than 200 businesses work with Irish hardwoods giving full time employment despite the small volume of hardwoods available.
Conference delegates heard that Growing for the Future, the government’s strategic plan for the forest sector, outlines an annual afforestation level of 50,000 acres. Of this 15,000 acres per year could be of broadleaved tree species – giving an area of just under half a million acres of new broadleaved forests by 2030.
The IHC says the employment creation potential of broadleaves exceeds that of conifers given the greater range of end use applications that can be serviced by hardwoods.
COFORD plans to continue to fund research aimed at improving the quality of hardwoods – a resource it says will increase in both area and economic importance.
