Major European forest research infrastructures opening up
Segnalato da: Giovanni Giuseppe Vendramin
PRESS RELEASE 20 January 2012
Major European forest research infrastructures opening up
thanks to the newly started project ‘Designing trees for the Future’ (Trees4Future)
Major forest infrastructures will be opened up to researchers from the public and private sectors across Europe. For the first time key infrastructures within the European forest-based sector, including databases, state-of-theart analytical tools and predictive models will be integrated and made available via a user-friendly, central access portal.
The four-year Trees4Future project aims to integrate major forestry resources and infrastructures, to provide the European forest-based and wider research community with easy and comprehensive access to currently scattered sources of information and expertise. This will make a significant contribution to helping the European forestbased sector respond, in a sustainable manner, to increasing demands for wood products and services in a context of changing climatic conditions and addressing the grand societal challenges.
The project will create a centralized access point via its web portal to major European databases in the area of forest genetics and forest ecology, and start to develop common protocols and reference standards for traits and species. Calls for transnational access will be made, so that researchers can take advantage of the joint expertise, services and data of the 28 partners in the project.
The first meeting of the project partners was held in Orléans, France on 17-19 January 2012. The coordinator Luc Pâques said: “This project is a great opportunity. We need to be ambitious as well as courageous – we are aiming to provide access to research infrastructures and services, and work together to share expertise, build new innovative tools, and integrate resources into a long-term framework. This will be a great benefit to the scientific community, and – through improved research e.g. on adaptation of forests to the effects of climate change – to the whole society.”
The total budget of the Trees4Future project is approximately 9 million EUR and it is co-funded by the EU’s 7th Framework Programme for Research and Innovation.
For more information please contact:
Luc E. Pâques
Coordinator of Trees4Future
INRA-Orléans
Tel. +33 (0) 2 38417821
Email: luc.paques@inra.fr
Gert-Jan Nabuurs
Vice-Coordinator of Trees4Future
European Forest Institute
Tel: +358 10 7734321
Email: gert-jan.nabuurs@efi.int
The Trees4Future partner organisations
- Institut national de la recherche agronomique (INRA, France)
- AIT Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH
- Stichting Dienst Landbouwkundig Onderzoek (ALTERRA, The Netherlands)
- Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Ernährung, Landwirtschaft und Forsten (ASP, Germany)
- Bundesforschungs-und Ausbildungszentrum für Wald, Naturgefahren und Landschaft (BFW, Austria)
- Universität für Bodenkultur Wien (BOKU, Austria)
- Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives (CEA, France)
- Fundación para o Fomento da Calidade Industrial e Desenvolvemento Tecnolóxico de Galicia (CIDTG, Spain)
- Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR, Italy)
- Consiglio per la Ricerca e Sperimentazione in Agricolturacra (CRA, Italy)
- European Forest Institute (EFI)
- Institut Technologique FCBA (Forêt Cellulose Bois-construction Ameublement, France)
- Fondazione Edmund Mach (FEM, Italy)
- Forestry Commission Research Agency (FR, UK)
- Instytut Badawczy Leśnictwa (IBL, Poland)
- Institutul de Cercetari si Amenajari Silvice (ICAS, Romania)
- Instytut Dendrologii Polskiej Akademii Nauk (IDPAN, Poland)
- Instituto de Investigação Científica Tropical (IICT, Portugal)
- Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Tecnologia Agraria y Alimentaria (INIA, Spain)
- Innventia AB (Sweden)
- INRA Transfert S.A. (IT, France)
- InnovaWood ASBL (IW, Belgium)
- Joint Research Centre – European Commission (JRC)
- Metsäntutkimuslaitos (METLA, Finland)
- Staatsbetrieb Sachsenforst (SBS, Germany)
- Universiteit Gent (Ugent, Belgium)
- Vlaams Gewest (VLAGEW, Belgium)
- Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institut Bundesforschungsinstitut für Ländliche Räume, Wald und Fischerei (vTI, Germany)
