Araucarias for the future

Climate change is affecting the Chilean flora, and the case of the natural monument and endemic tree of the native forest, Araucaria Araucana, is not the exception, since a large amount of it presents foliar damage; that means thar its branches are drying up.

That is why CMPC again focused its efforts to preserve this specie. Thus, the company signed on June 20th an agreement with the Chilean Forestry Institute (Infor) that aims to create a seed storage bank to ensure the genetic variability of the specie in the future. In addition, the company will deliver to Infor, within a year and a half, about 30 thousand specimens of Aaraucaria to be planted in areas where they grow better.

The agreement was signed by representatives of CMPC, of ​​Infor and of the Ministries of Agriculture and Environment of Chile, in the Carlos Douglas nursery, located in Cabrero, Biobío region, in the south of the country, and in the same place where the seeds will be stored and vivified.

This work is added to others, such as the one done in 2017, when CMPC joined a working group formed by the National Forestry Corporation (Conaf) and private, public and academic entities with the aim of finding an answer to why more than 81% of the Chilean Araucarias present foliar damages, according to a study of Conaf.

In addition, also in 2017, the company created a new  High Conservation Value Areas in the commune of Santa Juana, Biobío region, in order to protect the “Dwarf” Araucaria: an unknown type of Araucaria that does not grow more than two to three meters high despite the fact that the existing specimens are more than 100 years old.