The SustForest Plus project on “Multifunctionality, conservation and rural employment in the territory of southern Europe through resin extraction” was born in 2010 as a result of the firm belief that the European resin sector had to join forces in the face of a major challenge affecting France, Spain and Portugal: the impact of the global economy on their forest resources, sources of rural employment and high added-value products.
The transnational SustForest Plus initiative, co-financed by the Interreg Sudoe Programme through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), has since been a milestone for the European resin sector, and laid the foundations for the true transnational cooperation necessary to defend European resin interests by establishing long-term strategies and creating stable networks of joint collaboration that have made it possible to achieve the objectives of the European natural resin sector in the following domains:
- Resin territory. To mobilise the European resin resource to supply the local industry in a stable way.
- Resin tapper. To improve the quality of work of resin workers, thus generating stable and quality employment in rural areas of the Southwest European region.
- Natural resin. To expand the markets for derived products through the commercial and technological valorisation of the natural resin produced in the forests of Southwest Europe as a socially, economically and environmentally sustainable resource, within the new bioeconomy promoted by the European Union.
This website gathers all the results of the SustForest Plus project. From now on, the new operational groups ResinLab, ACREMA and RESINEX will be working to give continuity to resin research and innovation. Find out more here.
