ECE/FAO joint event discusses how forest-based industries can play a role to support the transition to a circular economy

30/06/2022

On the occasion of the launch of the UNECE/FAO publication “Circularity concepts in forest-based industries”, ECE/FAO Forestry and Timber Section and the FAO Liaison Office in Geneva joined hands in a virtual event to discuss the role of the sector in circular economy.

The ECE/FAO study analyses how the concepts of circular economy can be applied in the forest-based industries in five forest-based value chains: 1) sawn wood, bioenergy and construction, 2) furniture industry, 3) paper and pulp industry, 4) cellulose-based fibers, and 5) cellulose-based plastics. The analysis covers not only the potential opportunities for each sector from going more circular but also, for the first time, lists concrete actions by business and consumers on how to accelerate the circular economy as well as recommendations for policymaking.

“The ECE/FAO study reveals that the forest sector is extremely efficient in using all material throughout the production process and along its various value chains, said FAO Liaison Office in Geneva Director, Mr Dominique Burgeon.

“In FAO, we are looking now at the role of forests in green recovery and building inclusive and sustainable economies,” he said.

The recent FAO “State of world’s forests” showed that forests provide 33 million jobs, a 7.5 trillion USD value in ecosystem services and store 662 billon tons of carbon globally. This can trigger the transition towards circular systems in other strategic sectors which today struggle with out-of-proportions environmental footprints. Mr Burgeon also commented that “we have to keep in mind that replacing fossil materials with forest-based products will also increase the demand for wood,” at a time when the regenerative capacities of forest ecosystems are threatened by climate change, landscape degradation, soil erosion, forest fires and pests, this raises the question of whether fossil materials can really be replaced with wood as a fair and sustainable solution.

Mr Burgeon emphasized that “a lot depends on sustainable, responsible forest management practices at the global scale, which are key to the natural cycle of forests’ renewal and the sustainability of forest-based value chains. To ensure circularity and sustainability in the long term, it is of a fundamental importance to keep in mind, that we as consumers, have a choice to choose forest-based products from sustainably managed forests over other products on the market,” he concluded.