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PEFC’s 2025 Annual Review has been released, and PEFC says that the past year was one of progress, partnerships and impact, as it continued to advance sustainable forest management worldwide. Source: Timberbiz Across the PEFC Alliance, it strengthened its global network with new endorsed systems in Türkiye and Lithuania and a new standard in Croatia and welcomed CMPC Celulosa S.A. as an international stakeholder member. Last year also saw important steps forward in its strategic priorities. PEFC launched its Indigenous Peoples Engagement Program, opened a regional office in Gabon, and continued shaping the future of the PEFC system through new approaches focused on performance and impact. PEFC also advanced innovation across key areas, from expanding Trees outside Forests certification and progressing the PEFC Project Sourcing standard, to strengthening the role of certification in credible forest carbon projects and supply chain transparency. Throughout the year, PEFC engaged in global dialogues on forests, biodiversity and climate, and continued sharing the stories of forest owners and communities, highlighting the real world impact of certification on the ground. You can download a copy of the Annual Review here.

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The research originated in a project aimed at developing biofuels for ships but has since evolved into an environmentally friendly method for wood preservation. The path to new inventions is rarely straight or predictable, and this has certainly been the case for University of Copenhagen researchers Emil Thybring and Sune Tjalfe Thomsen. For several years, they have been working on a new, sustainable way to impregnate wood without harming the environment. Source: Timberbiz Today, the wood industry treats timber with heavy metals such as copper to extend its lifespan when used as a construction material. In the pressure treatment process, water with dissolved preservation chemicals is forced into the wood. The problem is that a large proportion of these substances is later leached out when the wood is exposed to rain, ultimately ending up in soil, marine environments and drinking water. “The toxic substances we introduce into the wood using water to make it last longer also leave the wood with water and end up in nature. It is a serious problem, and one we aim to solve with our technology,” said Emil Thybring, associate professor at the Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management. The researchers’ method is based on lignin, a natural binding agent in wood that stiffens the material and holds its cells together. Lignin is available in vast quantities as a residual product from the paper industry, where it is separated out and typically burned because it gives paper a brownish colour rather than the desired white. According to the researchers, just 15% of the EU’s lignin production could replace the environmentally harmful substances used across the entire EU production of pressure-treated timber. “It makes perfect sense to take a global industrial by-product and use it as an environmentally friendly alternative to the most widely used and environmentally damaging  wood protection methods we rely on today,” said Sune Tjalfe Thomsen, associate professor at the Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management. By dissolving lignin in alcohol, the researchers have succeeded in creating an extremely concentrated solution with such a high lignin content that it can impregnate wood very efficiently – a process they have dubbed “hyperlignification”. “Others have previously considered using lignin as a wood preservative and experimented with relatively dilute solutions. We work with much higher concentrations, which truly saturate the wood and protect it against fungal decay and rot,” said Emil Thybring. The method works by dissolving lignin – a natural binding agent in wood – in an alcohol-based liquid, allowing it to penetrate the wood’s microscopic structure. The researchers use a process similar to conventional pressure impregnation, in which the liquid is forced into the wood under pressure. The key difference is the much higher lignin concentration, making it possible to fully ‘saturate’ the wood with the natural material. Once inside the wood, the lignin alters the material’s internal composition, making it far less attractive to wood-degrading fungi. At the same time, the wood’s ability to absorb moisture is reduced, which is one of the primary drivers of bio-logical degradation. The result is a wood material that is far more resistant to the mechanisms that normally lead to rot and decay. “In laboratory trials, where we expose the wood to some of the most aggressive wood-degrading fungi under optimal growth conditions, we see a striking difference between untreated and hyperlignified wood. “For example, tests on pine and beech show that when fungi have decomposed around 50% of untreated wood, they have only broken down about 1% of the hyperlignified wood,” said Sune Tjalfe Thomsen. These results indicate that the treatment has the potential to significantly reduce the rate of degradation. The findings were obtained under controlled laboratory conditions. An important next step is therefore to assess the effect at larger scales and under realistic outdoor conditions. Ensuring that wood withstands outdoor exposure is not a new interest for Emil Thybring and Sune Tjalfe Thomsen, who could best be described as researchers with a long-standing interest in wood durability. For years, Emil Thybring conducted his own experiments in his backyard, testing various natural wood protection methods and monitoring them over time. Today, that interest has evolved into a full-scale research project, which has recently received more than DKK 15 million in funding from Innovation Fund Denmark’s Grand Solutions program. Last year, the researchers also won a major European innovation competition, the “Evergreen Prize for Innovation”, receiving EUR 300,000 to further develop their non-toxic wood protection technology. The Grand Solutions project has been named “HYPERLIGNO” and was officially launched in April. In collaboration with Frøslev – Denmark’s largest timber supplier to the construction industry as well as architects and other partners, the project aims to bring the research from the laboratory into production, trans-forming new knowledge into new wood products. “We need to dive deep into the lignin molecules because we can see that certain types of lignin penetrate deeper into the wood and provide better protection. This allows us to identify the optimal lignin source from the paper industry,” explains Sune Tjalfe Thomsen. The Hyperligno team aims to develop a product that could replace today’s toxic wood impregnation methods in Denmark and across Europe. At the same time, the EU is moving towards stricter regulation of biocides in wood, with a phase-out expected by 2030.

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South East Asia and the Pacific have some the last remaining untouched forests in the world. These primary forests are irreplaceable ecosystems, supporting rich biodiversity, storing vast carbon and sustaining the livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples. Source: Timberbiz However, across the region, these forests continue to decline despite their importance, even as overall forest area in Asia shows signs of increase. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is strengthening countries’ capacity to monitor and report on primary forests through a regional workshop taking place this week in Thailand, bringing together experts from across Southeast Asia and the Pacific to improve the quality, consistency, and comparability of data on primary forest extent and trends including the use of national forest inventories, geospatial data, and satellite imagery for their mapping. “To safeguard what remains of these vital ecosystems, countries need reliable and consistent data to guide action and track change over time,” said Alue Dohong, FAO Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific. “This workshop is an important step toward strengthening national capacities and ensuring better evidence for decision-making on primary forests.” FAO is working with countries to improve the consistency and quality of data reported to FAO’s Global Forest Resources Assessment (FRA), while also enhancing their ability to monitor primary forests over time. Organized under FAO’s work on primary forests and the Global Environment Facility-funded Strengthening Conservation of Tropical Primary Forests through Partnership Enhancement and Coordination of Support (SCOPE) project, the workshop brings together technical experts from Bhutan, Indonesia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Thailand and Viet Nam. Participants are reviewing and testing draft guidance and geospatial tools designed to support more accurate mapping and reporting of primary forests. These include hands-on training in tools such as Collect Earth Online and the Primary Forest Finder, which help countries assess forest extent and changes over time. Building a stronger evidence base Through this joint initiative with member countries and partners, FAO is developing biome-specific guidance, improving the shared understanding of what constitutes a primary forest, and strengthening national data systems. The workshop builds on earlier efforts, including a virtual session held in 2021, and contributes to the Southeast Asia and the Pacific Forests Integrated Program. It also supports global efforts to halt biodiversity loss and address climate change by improving the evidence base for forest conservation. Ultimately, more accurate and consistent data on primary forests will enable better-informed decisions at national, regional and global levels, helping to protect some of the planet’s most valuable ecosystems.

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Say ‘pines’ in Canberra, or in most of southern Australia, and people will probably think of plantations of Radiata (also known as Monterey) Pine which cover huge swathes of areas around Tumut and Bathurst, the south-east of South Australia and across Victoria and Tasmania. (Though ironically this pine is highly endangered in its very small natural range in coastal California and Mexico.) Source: Region However, there are some 50 species of native conifers (which means ‘bearing cones’ and not flowers) in Australia, whose ancestors grew across the world from about 300 million years ago, among forests of giant ferns and other plant groups which have long gone from the earth. This was well before the rise of the dinosaurs. In time they dominated the world for 100 million years and I’ll pause while you contemplate that, and then the dinosaurs did munch on them. Eventually though the flowering plants appeared and became dominant, but in many parts of the world, especially high on mountains and near the poles where it’s too cold for birds and insects to be reliable pollinators, the conifers still rule. They are not so dominant in Australia, though inland there are still extensive woodlands of cypress pines, which were heavily logged for their easily worked timber which is resistant to rot and termites. Many of the old shearing sheds on the plains in western NSW are made of cypress. However, today I want to introduce the only two native pines that grow naturally in the ACT, though neither is widespread. In drier rocky woodland areas, especially in Molonglo Gorge and along parts of the Murrumbidgee Corridor, dark green, Black Cypress Pines (Callitris endlicheri) appear in stands of often slender tapering trees. Like most cypress pines they bear both male and female cones on the same plant. The male cones are small, on the ends of the branches, and produce vast quantities of minute pollen grains which drift on the wind. Most of these are lost, but enough land by chance on an open female cone to ensure the success of the species. The rounded female cones are much larger and woody and stay on the tree for years holding the seeds. After a fire, which usually kills the tree, they will open to drop the seeds. However, in the absence of fire the cones will eventually open anyway. The cones are very hard, but any of the local cockatoos can crack them to extract the seeds. The other local native pine is very different in appearance and habitat. Mountain Plum Pine (Podocarpus lawrencei) belongs to a different family, the podocarps, whose ancestors arose in Gondwana and which are still only found in the southern lands. Most podocarps are rainforest trees, but Mountain Plum Pine grows as a sprawling ground cover across rocks high in mountains, even above the snow line. These shrubs provide crucial shelter for small animals by providing a still warm air layer between the rocks and the dense layer of small leaves even in winter when snow lies on top of the foliage. Unlike the cypress pines, Mountain Plum Pines have separate male and female plants. The male cones are small and purple, while the female cones are quite unlike those of the cypress pine – indeed they look like a glossy red berry, but this is misleading as they don’t contain a seed. The seed is carried in the open at the end of the stem, and it is the stem which is red and swollen to resemble a fruit and even contains sugars, to attract animals which then distribute the seeds. An excellent place to look for them is along the high parts of the Mount Franklin Road in Namadgi National Park (and early May is not too late to go up there to have a look). Just walk along the road beyond the locked gate on the slopes of Mount Ginini and watch the roadside on your right; there are very healthy Mountain Plum Pines growing on the roadside. If you rub the leaves between your fingers, you’ll immediately recognise this low shrub as a pine, even if your eyes say otherwise! I love our wildflowers as much as anyone, but there are other even older local plants which lack flowers but still deserve our attention and admiration.

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