Forest Products Industry

The European Union Deforestation Regulation has been postponed, amended and simplified since it came about in 2023, yet the central compliance challenge confronting wood pellet producers has barely changed. Source: Biomass Magazine Producers shipping into the European Union will need to demonstrate that their fibre is legal and deforestation-free, identify the plots where the wood was harvested and preserve the connection between those plots and the finished product. That requirement reaches beyond conventional sustainability certification and deep into supplier networks that were not designed to provide plot-level information. The latest delay moved the primary application date to 30 December 2026, while providing additional time for certain small and microenterprises. The United States has also been classified as a low-risk country, reducing some risk assessment and mitigation obligations for US suppliers. Neither development eliminates the need to collect geolocation data, document legality and maintain traceability. Instead, the added time has revealed a widening divide between companies that continued preparing and those that treated postponement as permission to wait. “The delays gave producers much-needed time to figure out how to collect geolocation data and work with suppliers to prepare for compliance,” said Barry Parrish, director of sustainability at ResourceWise. “The low-risk designation also eased some of the burden by removing the need for formal risk assessment and risk mitigation, allowing producers to focus more directly on data collection and traceability.” That focus is moving EUDR from the policy office to the procurement desk. Compliance will ultimately depend less on what pellet producers already know about their overall supply bases than on whether they can connect individual consignments to sufficiently detailed, verifiable records from forests, landowners, loggers, sawmills and other upstream suppliers. The full story is at: https://biomassmagazine.com/articles/the-traceability-test

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US Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L Rollins announced the US Forest Service has filed a proposed rule to rescind in its entirety the national 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule, a one-size-fits-all restriction that, according the government, has frustrated land managers and served as a barrier to wildfire risk reduction work across large swaths of America’s national forests. Source: Timberbiz “Our forests can’t afford another decade of inaction. Across the country, we’ve watched preventable conditions – overgrown stands, insect outbreaks and disease – turn healthy landscapes into tinderboxes,” said Mr Rollins. “For too long, outdated restrictions have kept tens of millions of forested acres off-limits to the very treatments that improve forest health and reduce wildfire risk to our communities. Today, we filed a proposal to restore authority to local forest managers who know the land best, removing the barriers that have kept them from doing the work the land demands. It’s time to turn the page on the failed roadless rule and return our forests to health and productivity.” For 25 years, the 2001 Roadless Rule restricted road construction and limited the Forest Service’s ability to carry out critical active management work within inventoried roadless areas. Today, that includes more than 44 million acres of the 193-million-acre National Forest System. The rescission is intended to prioritize local agency decision-making over regulatory rules that are the same across the country, regardless of specific land management issues and needs. “This proposed rule is commonsense policy sought since the first Trump administration. In the years since, the need for it has only become more apparent,” said Deputy Secretary Stephen A. Vaden. “It is a credit to President Trump that we can begin to put into place a rule that will allow us to properly manage our national forests, because the first step to managing forests is to have access to them.” The agency will seek public comment on the proposal and on a draft of the environmental impact statement filed today in the Federal Register. The rescission removes national designation of roadless areas but does not mandate timber cutting or road construction. The action removes regulatory burden and sends decisions about roadless areas to the local national forest managers. “Active forest management is not an option. It’s essential,” said Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz. “More than 40% of inventoried roadless areas, primarily in the West, have high or very high wildfire hazard potential. And only 5% of those areas have received hazardous fuels reduction treatments since 2014. “At the same time, more than a quarter of these lands, 11.3 million acres, are already near existing roads. Acting now, thoughtfully and decisively, is the best way to restore the balance, reduce wildfire risk, and secure the long-term health of our forests and neighbouring communities.” Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte said that for 25 years, the heavy thumb of Washington DC has hindered Montana’s ability to properly manage wildfire risk and road development on nearly 60% of Forest Service land across the Treasure State. “Today’s long overdue decision will empower states like Montana to pursue proper forest management on federal lands with local communities in mind. I’m grateful to President Donald J. Trump and Secretary Rollins for their strong leadership in restoring common sense to active forest management.” The proposed rescission reflects the administration’s commitment to return authority to local line officers and ensure they have the tools needed to restore forest health and productivity. The rescission aligns with Executive Order 14192, Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation, to alleviate unnecessary regulatory burdens, Executive Order 14225, Immediate Expansion of American Timber Production, Executive Order 14154, Unleashing American Energy, and Executive Order 14153, Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential. Returning roadless-area decisions to forest-level land management planning provides flexibility the national rule did not. Future land management decisions would be based on natural resource conditions and needs and informed by states, tribes, and communities. Rescinding the rule allows forest managers to address watershed, economic, and wildfire-risk conditions within the sideboards of existing laws, regulations, and policy. That would put those decisions within the same planning framework that guides individual plans throughout the National Forest System. More than 95% of inventoried roadless areas are in 10 Western states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. The proposed rule does not apply to national forests in Colorado and Idaho because those lands are under separate state-specific roadless regulations.

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