HoliSoils at the Forest Innovation Workshop
The 6th edition of the Forest Innovation Workshop brought policymakers, forest owners, practitioners, researchers, associations, and NGOs together to explore the latest forest innovations and key regional priorities.
The workshop, which was held in Brussels on 11 – 12 February 2025, was co-organised by one HoliSoils’ project partner – the European Forest Institute (EFI) – and two member organisations of the HoliSoils Stakeholder and End-User Advisory Board (SEAB) – the European Confederation of Forest Owners and the European State Forest Association. Also participating were many other forest actors and projects, including the ERIAFF network, the European Farmers and Agri-Cooperatives (COPA-COGECA), the European Landowners’ Organization (ELO), Euromontana, FOREST4EU, and OptFor-EU.
The workshop explored innovations in the forest-based sector, giving space to scientists and policymakers to share their points of view, while also featuring interactive discussions in smaller parallel sessions, and spotlighting various projects involved in European forests.
HoliSoils’ coordinator Aleksi Lehtonen (Luke) had the opportunity to present the project’s innovations and findings in a panel discussion on the scientific perspective on the future of forests, together with representatives of other research projects including RESONATE and FOREE. The panel also included a fruitful interaction with the audience on the role of forests in climate change mitigation.
HoliSoils provides innovative forest management solutions, which are often associated with advanced technical tools and products. The project is developing many innovative instruments and methods that can help scientists understand what is coming for forests, starting with their soils. These include a harmonised soil monitoring framework to identify and test soil management practices aiming to mitigate climate change and sustain provision of various ecosystem services essential for human livelihoods and wellbeing. Much of the groundbreaking science generated by the project is already accessible through the HoliSoils toolkit and the project’s publications repository in Zenodo.
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