The aftermath of the Covid pandemic in the forest sector: new opportunities for emerging wood products

Context: Over the last decade, the forestry sector has undergone substantial changes, evolving from a post-2008 financial crisis landscape to incorporating policies favoring sustainable and green alternatives, especially after the 2015 Paris agreement. This evolution was drastically disrupted with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, causing unprecedented interruptions in supply chains, product markets, and data collection. Grasping the aftermath of the COVID-19, regional instances of the forest supply chain sector need synthetic pictures of their present state and future opportunities for emerging wood products and better regional-scale carbon balance. But given the impact of COVID-19 lock-down on data collection, the production of such synthetic pictures has become more complex, yet essential. This was the case for the regional supply chain of the Grand-Est region in France that we studied. Aims: For this study, our aim was to demonstrate that an integrated methodology could provide such synthetic picture even though we sued heterogenous sources of data and different analytical objectives: i.e. (1) retrospectively evaluate the aftermath of COVID-19 pandemic on the supply chain outcomes within the forestry sector; and then (2) retrospectively explore possible options of structural change of regional supply chain that would be required to simultaneously recover from COVID-19 and transit to new objectives in line with the extraction of new bio-molecules from wood biomass, and with the reduction of the regional scale carbon footprint (in line with the IPCC Paris Agreement) Methods: To achieve this, our methodological approach was decomposed into three steps. We first used a Material Flow Analysis (MFA) recently conducted on the forestry sector in the Grand Est region to establish a Sankey diagram (i.e. a schematic representation of industrial sectors and biomass flows along the supply chain) for the pre-Covid-19 period (2014-2018). Then we compared pre-Covid-19 Sankey diagram to the only source of data we could access from the post-Covid-19 period (2020-2021) in order to estimate the impact of Covid-19. Finally, we used as input the reconciled supply chain model into a consequential Wood Product Model (WPMs), called CAT (carbon accounting tool) in order to compare three prospective scenarios: (1) a scenario that projected 2020-2021 Covid-19 conditions and assumed pre-Covid-19 business as usual practices, (2) a scenario illustrating the consequence or rerouting some of the biomass to satisfy the expected increase in pulp and paper production to satisfy the needs of the industry after Covid-19, and (3) a scenario that explored new opportunities in term of extraction of novel bio-molecules by the emerging biochemical wood industry. For every scenario we also evaluated the regional carbon gains and losses that these changes implied. Results: Our study conducted a detailed analysis of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the forestry sector's supply chain in the Grand Est region, using a dynamic and integrated Wood Product Model. We found significant disruptions during the pandemic period, with notable declines in industrial wood chips and timber hardwood production by 41.8% and 40%, respectively. Conversely, there were substantial increases in fuelwood, timber sawdust, and timber softwood, rising by 14.15%, 44.23%, and 15.29% respectively. These fluctuations underscore the resilience and vulnerabilities within the regional wood supply chain. Our findings also emphasize the potential for strategic rerouting of biomass flows to meet changing industry demands, which could play a crucial role in supporting the sector's recovery and adaptation to post-pandemic conditions. Discussion and conclusion: In addition, our study recognizes the limitations of the current approach combining MFA and WPM and suggests potential areas of enhancement. Ultimately, our findings shed light on the need to develop more integrated analytical methods to provide useful synthetic pictures of regional scale supply chains, when there is a need to adapt it to evolving situations and complex data landscapes.