Following the recent major windblow in Irish forests, the need for efficient and effective marketing and sale of windblown trees is central to ensuring timber growers get a good return on their crop.

The Irish Timber Growers Association (ITGA), which is represented on the Windblow Taskforce, has called for a co-ordinated National Response and National Windblow Strategy to address the catastrophic windblow growers are faced.

To this end, ITGA is working with other parties in the supply chain to improve roundwood sales systems, through a number of initiatives which are being made available to all forest owners.

These include an updated Template Tree Sales Agreement, a related Timber Sales Dispatch System, and information on roundwood prices through the Wood Price Quarterly (WPQ).

Such co-operation, and a National Windblow Strategy, is the most effective way that the association and the State can address the extent of the damage to our forests.

Template Tree Sales Agreement

The association has updated the ITGA Template Tree Sales Agreement, which contains best practice and procedures in timber harvesting and sales, including a Timber Sales Dispatch System.

The objective of the template agreement is to assist growers with the timber sale and harvesting process. It is always prudent to use a good contract/agreement and get professional forestry and any relevant legal advice before embarking on a timber sale with related harvesting activity.

Forest owners and buyers can adapt this template sale agreement to their own particular timber sale and forest. The template agreement is structured under various headings for clarity and ease of use.

The terms and conditions are designed to cover a range of potential sale situations and forest types, and include definitions, warranties, payment terms, rights of access, harvesting operational procedures and controls, indemnity and insurance, compliance, risk, health and safety issues, environmental conditions, force majeure and an arbitration clause.

It cannot be overstated how important health and safety, and indemnity and insurance issues are in harvesting and sale of windblown trees. Every forest owner must ensure they are fully protected in this regard.

This Template Tree Sales Agreement is available from the ITGA website. The use of this template agreement in timber sales and harvesting is considered best practice and has been approved as certification compliant.

It has also been one of the mandatory topics of the DAFM funded Forestry Knowledge Transfer Groups (KTGs).

In communications with the sector, ITGA has highlighted the importance of ensuring that any potential drying out of roundwood in sales is addressed by way of price and is considering how roundwood sales employing volume/weight ratios might be progressed in the sector.

The unprecedented volume blown in the recent storms will require concerted efforts from all parties to ensure that this timber is salvaged efficiently and to the benefit of all concerned.

The supply of roundwood from private forests has been forecasted to exceed supply from Coillte in the next two years and into the future, which is also reflected in the storm damage statistics.

Certification

This also impacts on the availability of certified timber for the processing sector, as only a very small proportion of private forests are certified.

The windblow has exacerbated this situation with forest certification, given over half of the estimated windblown timber is privately owned.

In order to access our sawn timber and panel board export markets, processors require their end products to be certified to an international certification scheme. For processed timber to be sold as ‘certified’, at least 70% of a processor’s roundwood input must be sourced from certified forests.

Over time, owners whose forests are not certified could be facing limited access to these more valuable markets. ITGA has been active with DAFM and others in endeavouring to facilitate Group Certification in Ireland.

It is important that mobilisation of the current windblown timber is made as streamlined and efficient as possible, to ensure that an optimal return can be achieved for all parties – and that the sector will be sustainable into the future.