The disaster that has struck the forests of northeastern Italy in recent days has filled all nature and wood lovers’ hearts with dismay however, it is a disaster that should give us pause.
This is a disaster that gives pause for thought to all operators and users of the wood product in our region and thus to us as well. We do not yet know how many trees were felled due to the flood rains and wind, but they certainly correspond to the wood industry’s needs for structures for many years to come. This tragedy could be an opportunity for our region to equip itself with a stronger and more competitive wood industry.
Mother Nature has carried out on a grand scale the zero-cutting that is prohibited by regulations in Italy. Now all those large areas of zero-cut forest are an immense reservoir of raw material for construction. We can either choose to equip ourselves with high-capacity sawmills and extraction tools such as harvesters and equip ourselves locally for the production of wooden structures by expanding our market by becoming an example of eco-sustainable builders or let that raw material be taken away by better organized foreign producers. Then there will also remain the burden of re-planting the felled trees, and this is another interesting industry in itself and one that allows the creation of jobs and absorption of CO2 from the atmosphere. On this occasion, we remind you that the use of construction wood stimulates the sustainable wood industry. Every plant that is cut is replanted and this allows more carbon to be taken out of the atmosphere. The presence of carbon in the atmosphere is responsible for the disasters resulting from global warming that has resulted in flooding in our region but also created fires with other forest loss in many parts of Europe from Sweden to Greece during the summer, and conscious building such as wood construction can help curb these disasters.