Last year was anything but a dull year for Wood for Good. The end of the Nordic Timber Council cast a shadow over our future funding; yet it was a year in which the Swedish Forest Industries Association committed to take up where the NTC left off – a vote of confidence reinforced by the swelling ranks of UK members contributing to the campaign.
It also saw the growth of timber frame lead to an unprecedented 20% share of UK new homes; yet the recent Colindale fire has presented the industry with a major challenge that the UK Timber Frame Association is taking steps to overcome.
It was also a year in which the PVCu window makers took on timber head on on sustainability and life cycle performance, only for the British Woodworking Federation, with wood for good’s help, to lead a response which should secure the wood window sector’s future.
Many of the challenges have been the result of success; of the fact that the industry is now seen to be winning the sustainability argument. Competitors are taking the wood industry seriously and fighting back.
In 2006 our major theme, Wood in Sustainable Development, became increasingly relevant, with the widening application of EcoHomes excellent or very good standards, the publication of the Stern Report, Gordon Brown’s announcement of a commitment to carbon neutral housing and, at the end of the year, the publication of the Code for Sustainable Homes.
As more competitors try to jump on the sustainability bandwagon, we have continued our PR and advertising campaign to keep wood’s renewability top-of-mind among specifiers and to encourage them to think about using wood when designing their buildings.
As part of this theme, we have engaged several publishing partnerships to create a body of information and inspiration. With our European partners, we published Tackle Climate Change: Use Wood, and to round off the year, we launched, together with TRADA, Wide Span Wood Sports Structures, an important tool in our campaign to ensure wood takes its fair share of the London Olympics and of sports building across the country.
When the campaign began in 2000, wood was considered to be part of the environmental problem, inextricably associated with deforestation. After six years’ promotion, and thanks to the industry’s efforts in sustainable forest management and certification, wood is now recognised as part of the solution.
We continue to place increasing emphasis on education, not just awareness. While our CPD seminars, run in conjunction with TRADA, reached almost 2,000 architects in 2006, the real news of the year was the launch of wood for good Online Learning. The modules, developed with TRADA and the Institute of Wood Science, provide up-to-date information in an accessible format, along with CPD certificates on the completion of a multiple choice test.
Another success of 2006 has been the website. Every month brings record numbers of visitors and downloads. In November alone there were almost 13,000 visits and 4,000 publications downloaded.
Many of the themes of 2006 will be continued during 2007. Our core programme continues to be generic, although, as the industry moves from commodity production to the more sophisticated provision of building solutions, often in the form of engineered wood, so our overall objectives become more value-focused.
We will continue to promote wood as a sustainable building material by using the Olympics as a catalyst, and we will develop further our co-operative projects, such as last year’s co-operative marketing programme with TIMCON. In 2007 we will be developing campaigns with a number of other organisations.
The year’s projects will include timber frame, life cycle assessment for wood windows, distributor support, wood packaging, the simplification of timber specification, and the Olympics. Much of the emphasis on the latter will be through our membership of Wood for Gold (see p17), which will press for fair procurement guidelines, as well as for a greater use of timber in stadia, the Olympic village and legacy housing as a means of delivering effective projects on time and on budget, while meeting sustainability targets – in particular the government’s commitment to minimising the Games’ carbon footprint.
So we start the year with three healthy resolutions: to make the most of co-operative partnerships within the industry; to maintain and enhance wood’s position as the most sustainable building material; and to ensure wood achieves its fair share from the Olympics.
