Forestry research centre marks 50 years of work on cork, pests and climate

The Forest Research Centre (CEF) at Lisbon's Instituto Superior de Agronomia has completed fifty years of multidisciplinary work. Forest-based activity makes up 4.6% of Portuguese GDP and employs 90,000 people. Highlights include a unique library of cork samples from over a thousand monitored trees, two international patents on cork processing, new Australian parasitoids against the eucalyptus snout beetle, and chestnut rootstocks resistant to ink disease. Researchers now use drones, satellites, lidar and AI, and offer free online simulators for managing six tree species. Future work will focus on anticipating climate threats and restoring degraded ecosystems.