Bark beetle emergency. A Unipd project to save forests

21 March isInternational Forest Day, established with the aim of raising awareness of the importance of forests for people and future generations, and their vital role in poverty eradication, environmental sustainability and food security.

On this occasion, the University of Padua relaunches thecampaign to finance project‘Bark Beetle Emergency‘. The project is conducted by the Departments of Territory and Agro-Forestry Systems (TESAF), and Agronomy, Animals, Food, Natural Resources and Environment (DAFNAE) of the University of Padua. It was inspired by the need to study, in areas destroyed by Storm Vaia, the proliferation of the bark beetle, a small insect naturally present in forests, which feeds mainly on damaged or weakened spruce plants.

Indeed, the great availability of wood (16 million cubic metres) on the Asiago Plateau after Vaia, combined with recent climatic trends, have allowed bark beetle populations to move from an endemic to an epidemic phase on our territory, with the risk of aggravating the damage wrought by the storm in 2018.

The aim of the project isto fund two three-year PhD programmes in Silviculture and Forest Entomology aimed at studying bark beetle proliferation and new methods and tools for prevention.

Emanuele Linguaof TESAF says,«Our department is trying to tackle this huge problem from many sides. How to deal with trees attacked by bark beetle and those that have collapsed? Which will be the forests of the future? How to restore forest cover in this territory? Which species should we include with reforestation, which ones should we facilitate with natural regeneration? We have to change the specific composition, if we want a more resilient population in the future also by adopting different types in an attempt to increase the biodiversity of forests.»

Hence, investing in study and research into the phenomenonis extremely important, since currently feasible interventions to prevent new proliferations of the pest in the future are almost limited.

Hence the communications agency AKQA s.r.l. and the Treviso-based playing card company Dal Negro have been involved. To support the University’s project, the latter has created a new version of regional playing cards called “Le Bellunesi”, dedicated to the city of Belluno. They recount in the 10 cards that make up the suit of sticks, the evolution of the parasite and its destructive action on the spruce tree.

Each of us can also personally support the‘Bark Beetle Emergency’ projectby using the dedicated page.