Sustainable forest management, promoting biodiversity, ecosystem protection and the use of biomass in the province of Malaga (Bio+Malaga).

PRTR Call for Proposals Project

This project proposes an adaptive forest management system based on the use of biomass for thermal use. The area of action corresponds to the National and Natural Park of Sª de las Nieves, and public forests of the Junta de Andalucía and municipalities, integrating scales of municipal, provincial, regional and state responsibility, with a strong impact on the bioeconomy of a region of extraordinary environmental value. The creation of the Bio+A Lab Center and the training and entrepreneurship programs will ensure local dynamization, the creation of green jobs, the ecological and digital transition, and the fight against depopulation.

Project

Line of action:

Terrestrial ecosystems

Status:

En ejecución

Location:

Malaga (Andalusia)

Geographic scope:

España

Execution date:

2024

Duration:

01/01/2024 - 31/12/2025

Typology:

Development and diversification of forestry uses and harvests

Total budget:

2,102,000.00 euros

Amount of aid from the Biodiversity Foundation:

1,996,900.00 euros

Related call

Entity / grouped entities

University of Cordoba

Official College of Forestry Engineers

Mancomunidad de Municipios de la Sierra de las Nieves (Association of Municipalities of the Sierra de las Nieves)

Spanish Red Cross

Background

In the surroundings of the Sierra de las Nieves there are about 33,000 hectares of public forests that require urgent silvicultural treatments to ensure their stability and persistence, and less vulnerability to fires, being necessary to optimize the environmental services of the forests through a new bioeconomic model. An active and sustained forest management will induce socioeconomic benefits with an impact on the demographic challenge by favoring the creation and maintenance of jobs linked to the forestry and energy sectors in the valorization of forest residues. Training and promotion of entrepreneurship will transform the territory (professionalization of the forestry sector and development of the new bioeconomy).

Strategic importance

The project will be a tractor at the socioeconomic level and with respect to the demographic challenge and will highlight the social profitability of forest environments. It includes a Forest Management Model and the creation of a center for the treatment and collection of harvested wood as a reference for innovation and entrepreneurship, including an experimentation laboratory and an accredited training classroom. The management model of the Bio+A Lab center will be transferred to develop similar centers that provide an outlet for biomass from the rest of the province and train its inhabitants. The resulting circular economy model guarantees the sustainability of forest environments, the conservation and improvement of biodiversity, the reduction of risks, the dynamization of the local economy and bioeconomy, the ecological and digital transition, and curbs depopulation. The Provincial Council guarantees the sustainability and viability of the project through the “Provincial Program for the Implementation of Climate Change Adaptation and Energy Transition Measures. Biomass and other renewable energies”.

Objectives

Bio+A seeks to optimize the conservation of biodiversity and the resilience of forest areas of high ecological value in the province of Malaga, especially in the Sierra de las Nieves region, creating synergies in the Serrania de Ronda, promoting the circular economy through the energetic and economic use of forest biomass under conditions of high risk of disturbances.

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