On the occasion of Forest Day today, ZERO – Sustainable Terrestrial System Association and Centro Pinus – Association for the Enhancement of the Pine Forest, highlight the “insufficient investment in fuel management,” which persists and “threatens the sustainability of the forest.”
The two entities also release the Forest Investment Barometer 2025, which indicates a “positive evolution in the implementation of forest policies,” with a positive trend towards the “diversification of species” and a negative aspect in the “absence of investment data by species.”
The barometer is a numerical index that gauges the annual progress of forest policy implementation, with a value ranging from 0 to 1, where 1 signifies full execution of the defined political goal.
It comprises four equally weighted indicators: public investment in forests, public investment in fuel management, trend in forest area loss, and trend in forest composition diversification.
This year it stands at 0.45, “still distant from the value of 1, where the achievement of forest policy targets is fully realized. However, compared to previous editions, there has been positive progress,” note the associations, which have been updating the barometer’s values since 2023.
According to information released today by ZERO and Centro Pinus, “the diversification of forest composition is the indicator closest to the target defined in the national roadmap for carbon neutrality, with 5,214 hectares achieved out of the annual target of 6,020 hectares. Reforestation with maritime pine has shown positive progress, amounting to 5,214 hectares, although still below the estimated need of 8,143 hectares.”
“Despite the positive progress in executing the main source of public funding – the Rural Development Program 2020 (PDR2020), with an execution rate of 66% – the proximity to the end of the framework should have revealed superior development,” they emphasize.
According to the statement released today, “investments were made in the natural regeneration management of maritime pine financed by the PDR2020, the pine resin production improvement program, or the pilot project ‘Forest Vouchers.’ However, a significant gap remains: the lack of public reports monitoring investment by species, a fact that prevents accurate assessment of progress and compromises transparency in public policies.”
“This limitation was considered in the barometer, reflecting the absence of data as a warning for the urgent need to create more effective reporting mechanisms, enabling disaggregated monitoring of the impacts of forest investments,” they add.
ZERO and Centro PINUS also believe that the newly approved 2025-2050 Forest Intervention Plan (PIF) “represents a strategic opportunity to change this scenario.”
“The implementation of this ambitious plan is an opportunity to change the paradigm in the monitoring of forest policy,” they emphasize, adding that the annual update of the barometer aims to “foster the alignment of forest investment with the profound transformation that the national forest requires.”
