Line of action:

Terrestrial ecosystems

Status:

En ejecución

Location:

Teruel (Aragon)

Geographic scope:

España

Execution date:

2024

Duration:

01/01/2024 - 31/12/2025

Typology:

Development and diversification of forestry uses and harvests

Total budget:

298,700 euros

Amount of aid from the Biodiversity Foundation:

283,765 euros

This is a project aimed at revitalizing forest management under the principle of sustainability, favoring biodiversity and the provision of ecosystem services, which expand and generate new opportunities for entrepreneurship and employment around it, creating productive fabric and social economy in the territory. The aim is to boost the forest bioeconomy through innovation, the circular economy and the promotion of sustainable production of forest products and other services in relation to tourism and recreational use. In addition, the aim is to promote training and the acquisition of competencies in the above-mentioned areas. With regard to line (b), forest management is intended to make landscapes more resilient, and to contribute to the generation of employment and capacity building, and to fix population in rural areas. It also promotes extensive livestock farming and agroforestry by improving infrastructure.

 

The aim is to open avenues of local development around the sustainable management of its main resource, forestry, and the promotion of the bioeconomy associated with it, trying to overcome the main barriers that hinder this development: the lack of training and technical-scientific bases.

The wooded forest area that will be the object of the Sustainable Forestry Management dynamization and technical assistance is 17,200 hectares, of which approximately 12,000 hectares are extensively grazed. It is estimated that at least 1,000 hectares will be subject to new planning and certification, and 400 hectares will be subject to management treatments (including fire prevention measures) promoted by the project.

This project aims to advance towards economic development and diversification of productive activities, through the use of knowledge and its application to improve the economic, social and environmental sustainability of traditional activities and other new ones related to sustainable forest management, in a rural context with a significant population crisis, but with a great forest wealth. The project is based on a previous diagnosis that evaluated the potential of this line of action in the local context, identifying priority lines of action, and seeks to advance in these areas from a solid scientific and technical basis. The aim is to promote the management of forests from a multifunctional perspective, making production, conservation and public use compatible, and advancing towards their adaptation to climate change, as well as promoting the transformation and commercialization of their resources through economic initiatives that contribute to the fixation of population.

• Forestry actions on >200 ha during the last 3 months of the project (felling, clearing, cubing, transport, clearing, pruning, firebreaks, sidings), and 1 plan for the restoration of an abandoned gravel pit to convert it into a 2 ha reservoir for livestock and recreational use.
• Studies of new potential uses of wood and start-up of a local wood processing and/or marketing company; 1 study on the processing and marketing of mushrooms and truffles; and 1 program to encourage the installation of biomass boilers (awareness-raising, dissemination of aid lines, fuel subsidies, negotiation of collective supply agreements, etc.). It also includes training in SFM (360 hours, 60 days, 10 students. Contains inventory, marking, cubing, classification and traceability, use of chainsaws and self-propelled forestry machinery); in agri-food entrepreneurship (online, 60 hours, 20 days) and in biomass heating installations (online). Creates a crew of 4 forestry workers; develops 1 plan to disseminate a network of unique forest sites, and 1 plan to raise awareness/educate on SFM and forest bioeconomy; and implements the transfer and replication program to other surrounding municipalities.