Develop more matchwood, evergreen tree varieties: Farmers

Coimbatore: Tree farmers from Tamil Nadu and neighbouring states have appealed to scientists at the Institute of Forest Genetics and Tree Breeding (IFGTB) in the city to come up with newer varieties of matchwood trees, pulpwood and plywood. They said there was a good demand for matchwood from the matchstick industry and low-quality wood from the handicraft industry.

Farmers are in the city to attend the two-day national workshop conducted by the IFGTB on ‘Securing wood demand through enhancing productivity of planted forests’. The aims of the workshop are to understand the quantity and types of woods demanded by industries across the country as well as to know about farmers’ needs to make tree farming more remunerative.

Speaking at the workshop, the managing director of Federation of All India Safety Match Consortium, S Palanikumar, suggested that the institute could start developing more matchwood and pencil wood supplying trees like Matti which can grow faster in different soils. “There are 3,000 matchstick companies in Tamil Nadu. Their demand is big, which even local farmers could not meet,” he said.

Srinivasan, who owns a firm which produce wooden handicrafts, said they are in need of low quality but easily available wood that is usually present in evergreen trees like rain trees and ficus trees.

IFGTB director Mohit Gera said the country had imported wood products worth Rs 45,000 crore to Rs 50,000 crore a year and must look for ways to increase supply from sources within the country. The demand of wood is 153 million cubic metres but we get only 77 million cubic metres of wood from forests, farmlands and imports, he added.

The workshop was inaugurated by principal chief conservator of forests and head of forest force, R K Upadhyay.