Global warming may harm timber industry - Climate - timber growth rates forecasted to be greater in the tropics than in temperate area - Brief Article

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), Dec, 2003

Global warming trends may seriously harm North America's stronghold on the timber production industry, a study from Ohio State University, Columbus, suggests. However, rising temperatures could mean an economic boom for the plantations in regions with subtropical climates, such as South America, Africa, and Asia-Pacific.

Global warming may cause forest growth patterns to change slowly, contends Brent Sohngen, associate professor of agricultural, environmental, and developmental economics. This shift in timber production could have serious ramifications for growers in temperate regions, such as North America, the former Soviet Union, China, Australia, New Zealand, and parts of Europe, areas that currently supply 77% of the world's industrial lumber. At the same time, growers in the subtropics will be able to expand their plantations of fast-growing trees to gain a larger share of the world market.

"Timber growth rates in the tropics can double those in cooler, temperate climates," Sohngen points out. "These plantations can raise the same amount of fast-growing softwood species in 10 to 30 years that their temperate counterparts can in 50 to 100 years."

The study predicts that the area occupied by tree farms in the tropics will rise an average of 675,000 acres per year for the next 50 to 100 years---an annual increase roughly the size of Rhode Island. These new plantations will typically be built on farmland that no longer is used for conventional crops.

Yet, productive temperate regions will not stop producing trees. Rather, a rise in temperature will cause their forests to undergo a shift in species. Temperate forests in Canada and the northern U.S. and Europe typically produce hardwoods such as cherry, oak, and maple. Warming temperatures will allow softwood species, primarily southern pine, to migrate north slowly and eventually take over the hardwood forests.