International workshop “Impact of climate change on forest work”

27/09/2013

In Europe, there are roughly 50,000 forestry contractors. They are crucial to the forest sector and its transition towards a green economy. By harvesting wood from the forests, they not only provide raw material to the forest industry and renewable energy producers; they also contribute to the sustainable management of forests.

Climate change is expected to directly impact forest contractors by, for example, generating arduous labour conditions (higher temperatures, wetter soils…), limiting harvest time (reduced period with frozen soil) or increasing volume harvested in forest, which have been damaged by pests, diseases, storm and fires. This will have bearing on the health and safety of forest workers, as well as the way forest operations are organised and conducted. Such consequences should be taken into consideration when developing related policies and training programmes.

The Ece/Fao/Ilo Joint Expert Network toimplement sustainable forest management is organizing a workshop to identify climate change related impacts on forestry work. To address those challenges, the meeting will review existing solutions and possible innovations and formulate recommendations for forest entrepreneurs, forest machinery manufacturers, forest owners as well as policy makers and training centres.

This workshop is scheduled to take place in Geneva on 11 November 2013. The event will be followed by a field trip on 12 November 2013.

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