Established in 1993 by a number of European states, the European Forest Institute (EFI) is an international organisation that now comprises 29 member countries and a further 120 member organisations. As the name suggests, they provide unbiased forestry-related knowledge, focusing on bioeconomy, resilience and governance. Director Marc Palahí took up the mantle in 2015, and has provided a new vision for the role of forests in the circular bioeconomy. With a PhD in forestry and economics, and work featured in prominent journals such as Nature, Palahí has produced an ambitious vision for 2025 which sees European forests as the “most important” biological infrastructure and focuses on processes such as wood engineering to enable a sustainable future for Europe. Palahí also leads the Circular Bioeconomy Alliance, established by HRH The Prince of Wales under his Sustainable Markets Initiative. It hosts the EU FLEGT Facility in order to support the EU Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) process in developing countries. It also hosts the EU REDD Facility, which supports partner countries tackling deforestation.
