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Wood Utilization
Industry
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Why AZFRP
"We
decided to create AZFRP because the economically viable
utilization of small diameter trees removed during
ecological restoration is the only realistic funding solution
for timely landscape scale restoration."
The AZFRP
Team
Decades of
overgrazing, selective logging and indiscriminate fire
suppression in the forests of the Southwest have resulted in the
proliferation of small trees and the accumulation of a large
amount of natural fuel. This situation creates conditions
for uncharacteristic high-intensity crown fires that consume
tens to hundreds of thousands of acres at a time, scar irreplaceable
ecosystems, destroy private and public property worth billions
of dollars, and claim the lives of fire fighters and residents. |
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"Ponderosa pine forests in northern
Arizona have
shifted from naturally open conditions to high densities of
small diameter trees in the last century, dramatically
increasing the size and severity of wildland fires. These
circumstances represent a loss of ecosystem services such as
biodiversity and watershed health, climate change mitigation,
and recreation and scenic values that are tied to
Arizona’s economy
and quality of life.”
Four
Forest Restoration Initiative
Landscape Restoration Strategy Report, October 1, 2010 |
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The U.S.
Forest Service, ecologists, biologists, environmentalists, local
communities and other constituents with an interest in
preserving the heritage and value of the forests of the
Southwest have come to agree that a key component of restoring
the forest to a fire-adapted ecology is to implement landscape
scale thinning of small diameter trees. However, the high cost
of restoration in northern Arizona - typically $1,000 per acre -
makes it unlikely that the U.S. Forest Service will be able to
fund forest restoration across the one million acres
collaboratively identified as needing mechanical thinning. |
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It currently costs
the U.S. Forest Service approximately $1,000 per acre to implement
restorative mechanical thinning in the Ponderosa pine
forests of Northern Arizona.
The collaborative
group has identified the need to urgently restore at least 1
million acres in Northern Arizona.
At the current
agency cost of $1,000 x 1 million acres, restoring Northern
Arizona forests would cost the U.S. Forest Service at least
$1 billion.
This money is simply
not available from the U.S. Treasury.
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What the
U.S. Treasury cannot accomplish, the economy must undertake,
relying on the market forces rather than government subsidies. This is
the reason why AZFRP proposes a private investment to create at
appropriate scale an economically viable small diameter trees utilization
infrastructure capable of funding the implementation of
landscape scale restoration in Northern Arizona. |
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The
vision of Arizona Forest Restoration Products Inc. (AZFRP) is to
convert the low value small diameter trees harvested during
ecological restorative thinning into high value engineered wood
products in order to create an economic engine that will fund
the restoration of northern Arizona's forest. |
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We believe
that to achieve effective forested ecosystems restoration:
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Restoration must be implemented at the same scale
catastrophic fires are taking place. This means landscape
scale.
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Old
growth and large trees must be protected and thinning must
be focused on small diameter trees. This means restorative
thinning must be ecologically sustainable.
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Because the cost of restoration exceeds the ability of the
Forest Service to fund,
an
economic engine must be designed to pay for restoration.
This means value-added small diameter trees utilization must
make restorative thinning become economically viable.
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Restoring the forests of the Southwest to their historical
and natural range of variability is a societal problem that
no stakeholder can resolve alone. This means restoration has
to involve all stakeholders collaboratively.
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The
vision of Arizona Forest Restoration Products Inc. (AZFRP) is that
effective ecological restoration must integrate:
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