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For Europe as a whole, the projected increase in forest productivity is higher than the projected economic losses from wildfires, windstorms and bark beetle outbreaks.
Opposing effects
Climate change affects forest productivity, and thus the timber industry in Europe, in two ways. On the one hand, there is a positive effect: higher CO2 concentrations act as fertilizer for trees, increasing productivity. Additionally, the growing season in boreal and mountain ecosystems will lengthen, which also contributes to higher forest productivity. A higher productivity of forests increases the growing stock, which in turn enhances the timber value of forests. On the other hand, forest fires, storms, and bark beetle outbreaks damage trees, causing them to die and productivity to decline.
The net result of these two opposing effects of climate change has been evaluated for Europe in a recent study. This has been done for the recent past – the reference period 1981–2005 – and scenarios of future climate change for the period 2076–2100. The evaluation included the disturbances for forestry because of wildfires, windstorms and bark beetle outbreaks. The effects of invasive alien pests and pathogens were not included.
Disturbances now
Natural disturbances reduce the value of European forests for the timber industry. Until recently – the period 1981–2005 – the loss of value of these forests because of natural disturbances was €115 billion. This agrees with a loss of about 29% compared with the counterfactual of no disturbance.
On an annual basis, the economic costs of natural disturbances is a little over €1.7 billion. This agrees with on average 74.5 million m3 of timber damaged per year.
Disturbances by 2100
Under a moderate scenario of climate change, the impact of natural disturbances on European forests further increases. By the end of the century, this results in a projected loss of the value of these forests for the timber industry of €186 billion compared with the counterfactual of no disturbance.
On an annual basis, under this moderate scenario of climate change, the economic costs of natural disturbances is projected to be almost €2.8 billion. Part of this economic loss of forest values – damaged and destroyed trees – is harvested in addition to the planned harvest. As a result, future timber harvest will increase not only because of the increasing forest productivity, but also because of this unplanned harvest. In recent years, the annual volume of timber produced was about 260 million m3 per year. The projected increase of timber harvest under the moderate scenario of climate change for the period 2076–2100 is about 17%.
Hotspot central Europe
Within Europe, the projected costs of future disturbances are highest in central Europe, especially in parts of Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic. These projected costs are lowest for the forests in northern Europe. Projected disturbance costs in southern Europe are between those in northern and central Europe.
Productivity gains offset disturbance losses
For Europe as a whole, the projected increase in forest productivity is higher than the projected economic losses from disturbances. Regional variation within Europe is high, however. In northern Europe, projected economic gains from increasing productivity clearly outweigh disturbance-related losses under climate change. in southern Europe, disturbances increase while productivity is projected to stagnate or decline.
As a result, net timber-related forest value is projected to increase in northern and decrease in southern Europe. In central Europe, economic losses from disturbances are compensated by gains in productivity, and net forest value remains more or less the same.
According to this study, Europe’s future forest value is independent of the degree of climate change. Under a higher or lower scenario of climate change, the economic effects of productivity change and disturbances increase or decrease at similar rates, and the net effect is approximately the same.
Caveats
A few caveats must be added here. The adverse effects of disturbances extend beyond the timber industry, including non-marketable eco-system services. Besides, this study only focused on the economically most important tree species, while adverse effects of water stress were not included. On the other hand, the effects of alternative silvicultural strategies to reduce the vulnerability of forests to climate change were not considered.
Source: Mohr et al., 2025. Nature Climate Change 15: 1078-1083.
