Marc Palahi, Director of the European Forest Institute, has also published a personal viewpoint on achieving the goals of the Green Deal, based on insights gained from working with a vast amount of scientific research and publications.

Marc Palahi points out that the new Forest Strategy must outline a compelling vision of why and how European forests, forestry and industry solutions can serve as a central pillar in a post-fossil economy. Marc Palahi notes that the new strategy must offer more than just a magnifying glass to view forests as a sticking plaster for a damaged economy; it must be a tool of transformation to create a new paradigm: a circular bioeconomy.

A new strategy is urgently needed to both respond to the risks threatening European forests and to seize the opportunities offered by the forestry sector. On one hand, climate change and natural process risks can threaten the ability of forest ecosystems to provide society with all the necessary values; on the other, the forestry sector faces a unique opportunity to create new, renewable solutions that will build a low-carbon economy, providing jobs for a socially and territorially equitable transition.