Trees by design
The wood industry in Europe is facing many challenges as the continent’s forests come under environmental and socioeconomic pressures. One way to tackle these pressures is through forest tree breeding that can improve productivity and encourage forest sustainability. Accordingly, the EU-funded TREES4FUTURE (Designing trees for the future) project brought together 28 research institutes from 13 European countries to address the challenge in a multidisciplinary consortium. It saw forest tree breeding and planting as a tried and tested solution that can enhance European forests and the wood industry. To achieve its aims, the project team focused on improving data gathering, archiving and standardisation so that researchers in forestry and science can benefit from quality data streams and sources. It also worked on developing or upgrading analytical and modelling tools in order to better exploit data sets. More specifically, the team developed and tested new phenotyping approaches to assess phenological, hydraulic and composition traits of trees such as transpiration, conductivity and durability, supported by non-destructive infrared spectrometry. It also standardised field trait assessment methodologies, including molecular laboratory procedures, enhancing data gathering related to plasticity, wood formation and epidemics. This was supported by the establishment of a web portal that offers genetic and environmental data. TREES4FUTURE also developed breedR, a new toolbox to analyse genetic trials that improves estimation of genetic values of trees. It designed different modelling tools for forest resources to evaluate forest sustainability, including related goods and services. The tools can effectively model native and cultivated species using environmental and genetic data from international field trials, in addition to supporting breeding and deployment. Project achievements also involved establishing expert research groups on topics related to climate change. In parallel, the researchers proposed approaches and roadmaps to set up pan-European forestry labs, along with a forest material traceability system and a European tree breeding centre. Overall, the project led to successful cross-discipline collaboration among laboratories. Its outcomes provide an excellent basis to advance the sustainability of the forestry sector across Europe.
Keywords
Trees, tree breeding, forestry, wood, sustainability, TREES4FUTURE
