The European Forest Institute (EFI) – Establishing Climate-Smart Forestry and forest restoration pilots in Europe G-04-2023
Programme Category
Programme Name
Identifier Code
Call
Summary
The aim of this call for grants is to set up Climate-Smart Forestry (CSF) and forest restoration pilots across Europe as a basis for developing an evidence-based understanding of effective CSF and restoration management practices in supporting climate change mitigation, adaptation, and biodiversity.
Detailed Call Description
FORWARDS is a project funded by the European Union that will prototype the ForestWard Observatory, a pan-European monitoring and evaluation tool that will help in demonstrating the impact of climate change on forests, and guiding decision-making for practical forest management.
Supported projects and activities must address all the issues listed below:
- Establish new field trials in forests for CSF and restoration management practices or test new practices in existing field trials.
- Address at least one of the following topics:
- Strengthening of forests and forest management for climate change mitigation. o Enhancing the resilience of forests to natural disturbances and/or droughts.
- Adaptation of forests and forest management to new growing conditions.
- Restoring forest biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and ecosystem services
- Conduct field measurements in controls and treatments, considering both living forest biomass and forest soils. This should include at least tree and stand-level measurements, including tree species, diameter at breast height, height, tree locations, crown dimensions, defoliation (according to ICP-Forest), increment.
- Address impacts of management practices on multiple CSF and restoration indicators including at least carbon stocks and sequestration in forest biomass and soil, forest damage, tree species composition, forest productivity, and dead wood.
- Provide open access data to measurement data from the field trials.
Data and results from the supported activities must be made available open access upon completion of the project, and feed into the ForestWard Observatory that is being developed by the FORWARDS project.
Applicants are advised to visit https://efi.int/grants-training/grants/G-04-2023 regularly before the deadline for the submission of applications for any Q&A, and updates or modifications regarding this grant process.
Call Total Budget
Financing percentage by EU or other bodies / Level of Subsidy or Loan
The maximum grant value is €140 000.
It is expected that around 5 projects will be funded under this call (max 1 grant per lot).
Projects are expected to start in January 2024 and the duration of the projects is 18 months. The activities shall be completed at the latest by August 2025, although with assured continuation of the trial(s) for a minimum of 3 years.
Thematic Categories
- Agriculture - Farming - Forestry
- Environment and Climate Change
- Research, Technological Development and Innovation
Eligibility for Participation
- Central Government
- Large Enterprises
- Legal Entities
- NGOs
- Non Profit Organisations
- Other Beneficiaries
- Private Bodies
- Semi-governmental organisations
- State-owned Enterprises
Eligibility For Participation Notes
Applications can be submitted by one legal entity or a consortium of legal entities. Applicants must, meet the following criteria in order to be eligible for the grant:
- Applicant is a legal entity (legal person). If the application is submitted by a consortium (grouping of legal persons represented by a coordinator), this criterion applies to all the participants. This call is not open for applications from natural persons.
- Applicant eligible for funding under the European Union Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme. If the application is submitted by a consortium, this criterion applies to all the participants.
Applications must indicate the European and biogeographic region(s) that is targeted by the project. European regions (North Europe, Central-West Europe, Central-East Europe, South-West Europe and SouthEast Europe) follow country groups as defined by Forest Europe in its State of Europe’s Forests reports.
Call Opening Date
Call Closing Date
EU Contact Point
All applicants may contact to ask questions and clarify any points on general or technical procedures and call content by sending an email message to forwards@efi.int