Blockchain Papers

Lukas Stopfer, Benjamin Engler, Thomas Purfürst

Blockchain technology (BCT) is often discussed as digital support for timber traceability in the context of the EU Deforestation-Free Products Regulation (EUDR), which requires operators and traders to demonstrate legality, deforestation-free production, geolocation at the forest parcel level, and verifiable supply chain documentation from 30 December 2026, with an extended timeline for micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) until 30 June 2027. This study assesses where BCT can realistically add value in timber supply chains under operational forestry conditions and identifies the necessary technical, organizational, and legal prerequisites. A combination of a targeted literature review and empirical input from experts in the forestry and timber industry, including guided expert web-conferencing interviews (n = 41), an online survey (n = 69 completed responses), and a transdisciplinary workshop (n = 18) was utilized to obtain a comprehensive overview of industry perspectives. Qualitative data from interviews and workshop sessions were analyzed using structured qualitative content analysis, while survey data were evaluated using descriptive statistics. The expected benefits are associated with the introduction of tamper-proof timber harvesting practices and cross-organizational verification mechanisms. To address the discrepancy between biological uncertainty and digital rigidity, the study proposes a dynamic allocation model adapted from the energy sector that distinguishes between fixed and variable wood capacities to automate logistical planning via smart contracts. However, respondents emphasize that practical obstacles, such as limited digital maturity in forestry, fragmented data infrastructures across the supply chain, and unresolved issues of data sovereignty hinder the implementation of BCT. BCT alone is unable to resolve the problem of weak physical-digital identity continuity, a phenomenon widely known as the oracle problem; however, coupling the ledger with physical or biological anchors (e.g., photo-optical, automated inkjet marking identification) can re-establish this physical–digital continuity and thereby resolve the oracle problem. The results demonstrate that blockchain acts most plausibly as a supporting component within hybrid traceability architectures that prioritize event-based authentication, off-chain data processing where appropriate, and integration with existing certification systems. The study highlights the necessity of defining distinct organizational roles and responsibilities while integrating user-centric digital solutions tailored specifically to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Ute Schüttoff, Laura Glaser, Tim Pawlowski

No abstract is available for this record.

Luca Buonocore, Jim Yates, Riccardo Valentini

The increasing importance of forest ecosystems for human society and planetary health is widely recognized, and the advancement of data collection technologies enables new and integrated ways for forest ecosystems monitoring. Therefore, the target of this paper is to propose a framework to design a forest digital twin (FDT) that, by integrating different state variables at both tree and forest levels, creates a virtual copy of the forest. The integration of these data sets could be used for scientific purposes, for reporting the health status of forests, and ultimately for implementing sustainable forest management practices on the basis of the use cases that a specific implementation of the framework would underpin. Achieving such outcomes requires the twinning of single trees as a core element of the FDT by recording the physical and biotic state variables of the tree and of the near environment via real–virtual digital sockets. Following a nested approach, the twinned trees and the related physical and physiological processes are then part of a broader twinning of the entire forest realized by capturing data at forest scale from sources such as remote sensing technologies and flux towers. Ultimately, to unlock the economic value of forest ecosystem services, the FDT should implement a distributed ledger-based on blockchain and smart contracts to ensure the highest transparency, reliability, and thoroughness of the data and the related transactions and to sharpen forest risk management with the final goal to improve the capital flow towards sustainable practices of forest management.

Faith T. Campbell

Invasive exotic or alien species cause enormous damage to the natural environment. Indeed, 49% of all imperiled species in the United States are threatened in part by alien species (Wilcove et al. 1998). The toll may be even higher: Additional plant species have been harmed by alien species but have not yet been designated as imperiled (e.g., the American chestnut, Fraser fir, American elm, flowering dogwood). Losses in the agriculture, forestry, and other sectors of the US economy and control costs associated with invasive alien species total $137 billion annually. Approximately $80 billion of that amount is associated with alien plants, insects, and disease pathogens subject to phytosanitary regulations (Pimentel et al. 1999), which are the subject of this article. Because attempts to eradicate established invasive alien species have met with little success, scientists recommend that governments put the highest priority on preventing introduction of such species. This article examines US policies governing the structure and implementation of prevention programs aimed at alien plants and those insects and disease pathogens considered to be plant pests. Whereas many invasive plants have been imported deliberately, insects and fungal pathogens usually hitch a ride with imported cargo. As Chris Bright noted during a presentation at the Worldwatch Institute on 8 October 1998, international trade “leaks” exotic species. Many others also have predicted that severe damage would follow introduction of insects and fungal pathogens from forests in Europe, Mexico, Asia, or other regions that trade heavily with the United States (Forest Service 1991, 1998, Campbell and Schlarbaum 1994, Niemela and Mattson 1996, APHIS 1998c, 1998d). Some types of imports are particularly likely to transport hitchhikers. Live plants imported for horticultural use, for example, have been called a “uniquely efficient pest introduction pathway” (Regelbrugge 1998). Between 45% and 86% of various categories of pests introduced to California in recent decades came in on horticultural imports (OTA 1993). Among forest pests that were most likely introduced on imported live plants are dogwood anthracnose (Discula destructiva Redlin) (Campbell and Schlarbaum1994), Melampsora fungus on larch and poplar, and pine pitch canker (Fusarium subglutinans f. sp. pini) on Monterrey pine (Pinus radiata) (Haleamau 1998). Like live plants, “green” wood—raw or unprocessed wood—is a high-risk import. Crates, pallets, spools for cable, and other packaging are often made from low-quality, pest-damaged wood. When not in use, these items are usually piled in the open air, thus facilitating pests' establishment (APHIS 1998d). As US imports have grown—by more than 50% just since 1990 (GAO 1997)—so too has the quantity of solid wood packaging in which they are shipped, thus presenting more opportunities for exotic species to travel to North America. Another wood pathway for pests is through imported logs, unprocessed lumber, and wood chips. Those US imports once came almost exclusively from Canada, which is a low-risk source because forests in these two nations are contiguous. However, beginning in the 1990s, US wood processors have imported increasing quantities of green wood from geographically separate areas that harbor pests inimical to US forests. Although Canada still supplies more than 70% of US wood imports, Mexico supplies more than 3%, China more than 2%, Chile nearly 2%, and New Zealand about 0.6%; the remainder comes from tropical countries. These imports are expected to increase in the future now that a court injunction limiting imports has been lifted. Some knowledgeable observers, including scientists working with horticultural and forest pests (La Fage and Williams 1979, Niemela and Mattson 1996), as well as the National Plant Board (National Plant Board 1999), have concluded that the phytosanitary safeguards set out by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) are inadequate to prevent introductions at current trade levels. According to the National Plant Board, “Recent breaches of the APHIS-PPQ [Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, Plant Protection and Quarantine] safeguarding system that led to entry of dangerous invasive plant pests in the U.S. have raised concerns that current organizational policies and procedures are inadequate to execute Agency functions…. Clearly, the current safeguarding system cannot meet the changes thrust upon it by rapidly transforming global circumstances” (National Plant Board 1999, p. 40). Yet with imports rising, the danger of alien organisms reaching America is increasing, and phytosanitary controls would have to be tightened commensurately to ensure the same level of protection. APHIS has begun to strengthen its regulations for wood packing (APHIS 1998e, 1999a) and lumber from Mexico (APHIS 1999b); both of these rulemakings are still in process. Nonetheless, it has fought in court against scientists who argue that regulations should be strengthened also for logs and lumber from New Zealand and Chile; it has rejected similar pleas from the Oregon Department of Agriculture for regulation strengthening. Moreover, the USDA has relaxed controls for certain horticultural imports. To be “science based,” a phytosanitary program should reflect the serious threat posed by exotic species to agriculture, horticulture, and forestry, and to the myriad natural ecosystems and biotic communities found from Alaska to Florida and from Maine to Hawaii. It should also reflect practical realities. First, ecologists realize that their knowledge of the millions of insects, fungi, and disease pathogens living in the habitats of US trading partners is limited. Indeed, probably less than 5% of the Earth's fungi have even been named by science; fewer still have been studied enough to determine their ecological role. Scientists know more about exotic insects and plants, but even among these groups are tens of thousands of species that have not been well studied. Given these large information gaps, it may well be impossible for scientists to predict which foreign species might cause devastating damage if introduced to a new ecosystem. Second, biological invasions are usually irreversible, given current scientific knowledge, limited funding, and burgeoning pest problems. In other words, it is far easier—and less expensive—to prevent an invasion than to combat one. It follows that a sound phytosanitary program should seek to bar entry to all exotic organisms except those that have been evaluated and determined to be very unlikely to be invasive. Two slogans express this goal: “If in doubt, keep it out” and “Guilty until proven innocent.” To put this objective into practice, the responsible government agency—USDA's APHIS—could combine technological treatments with stringent regulatory requirements that importers act to minimize the likelihood that living, unapproved insects, fungal pathogens, viruses, or weeds will hitchhike to this country on imported goods. This approach obviates several problems. First, it reduces the burden on port inspectors, who would otherwise have to search millions of shipments for tiny, even microscopic, organisms. Second, it reduces the risk that an erroneous assessment of the potential impacts of an organism will result in a decision to allow entry of a species that turns out to be highly damaging. An appropriately serious phytosanitary program should also seek out and utilize all available and emerging information on pests, pathways, and exclusion or mitigation technologies, and rapidly adapt regulations to reflect that new information. However, USDA officials have rejected the “If in doubt, keep it out” policy (Isi Siddiqui [US Deputy Under Secretary of Agriculture], personal communication, 1998), finding it incompatible with trade promotion; APHIS is now trying to “balance” protection and trade promotion. Thus, rising trade volume is not the sole reason that the threat of introduction of harmful bioinvaders is growing. Although USDA policy that proves ineffective can be changed through domestic political channels, pro-trade policies now have the force of international law through US adherence to global trade rules enforced by the World Trade Organization (WTO). Thus, if these policies do result in too high a risk of introduction of pests, international treaties adopted by 135 countries must be changed—a daunting challenge. Phytosanitary measures are no longer adopted unilaterally in response to a country's perception of risk. Phytosanitary safeguards are now subject to international standards and review. In 1994 more than 100 countries concluded the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade by forming the World Trade Organization, which sets the rules for international trade. To prevent member nations from using phytosanitary safeguards to protect domestic agricultural producers from foreign competition, the signatories simultaneously adopted the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS agreement; see www.wto.org). In November 1997, the 46-year-old International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC), which was formed to control plant pests and diseases and prevent their spread across national borders, was revised to bring it into compliance with the SPS agreement. (The IPPC revisions have not yet come into force, however, because too few nations have ratified the changes.) Under the SPS agreement and revised IPPC, countries may impose trade restrictions to the extent necessary to protect human, animal, or plant health—including wild fauna and flora—as long as they apply the same standards for protection across the board, domestically as well as internationally. Phytosanitary measures must be based on scientific principles and supported by scientific evidence, as documented in a risk assessment. When scientific information is insufficient to meet the requirements for risk assessment laid out in the SPS agreement, a country may adopt a provisional regulation while seeking more information. Taking into account available scientific evidence, the risk assessment should address processing or production methods; inspection and sampling methods; prevalence of the target organism—or the existence of pest- or disease-free areas—in the exporting and importing countries; ecological and environmental conditions; and quarantine or treatment measures that could control any pest that is introduced. A risk assessment should also take into consideration the potential damages from introduction of a pest or disease (such as losses in production or sales and the cost of control or eradication) and the cost-effectiveness of alternative approaches to limiting risks. The SPS agreement states that phytosanitary regulations should not be more restrictive than necessary to achieve a country's chosen level of protection—which could be set at zero risk—and that the process of their promulgation must be transparent. Finally, the SPS agreement grants developing countries more time to comply with international phytosanitary standards and calls on WTO member countries to give them technical assistance. Countries that believe their exports have been discriminated against may challenge the importing country's phytosanitary protections as nontariff barriers to trade; if the challenger wins its case, the importer must either revise the phytosanitary regulations or pay a penalty. The penalty can be substantial: For example, after the European Communities (EC) refused to accept a WTO Appellate Body ruling allowing entry of US beef from cattle treated with growth hormones, the United States imposed a $116.8 million tariff on various European food exports (Williams 1999). The SPS agreement is only now being interpreted—often through official decisions of WTO dispute settlement bodies—thus many questions remain to be answered about what the agreement allows. USDA is wrestling also with questions about how it will apply certain provisions. For example, what level of protection should the United States strive to maintain? Which agencies, in addition to APHIS, should weigh in on this policy? Because any pests introduced as a result of APHIS policies will affect everyone in the United States, as well as the environment, all of the issues surrounding the SPS agreement should be the subject of broad discussion. Two topics in particular—determination of an appropriate level of protection and “quarantine pests”—should be part of that discussion. As mentioned above, each country has the right to set its own level of protection, even if that level is zero risk. However, a country must consistently apply comparable levels of protection in comparable situations; a further limitation to this right to determine an appropriate level of protection, according to the WTO Appellate Body, is that the country is obligated to demonstrate a scientific justification for the selected level of risk (Victor 1999). The consistency requirement exposes any phytosanitary safeguard to comparison with other domestic or international statutes aimed at managing a comparable risk or—importantly—to comparison with the absence of such statutes. A gap in the protection provided by these statutes could be cited as proof that a stringent phytosanitary regulation is inconsistent with existing standards. Indeed, the Appellate Body ruled against Australia when that country banned imports of salmon largely because the sanitary measure for salmon imports was more stringent than that for other fish imports judged—by the WTO dispute panel—to pose an equal or greater risk (WTO AB-1998-5). For stringent phytosanitary safeguards to survive a challenge under the SPS agreement, then, countries must close any loopholes in regulations governing comparable situations. Of course, tightening these statutes takes time and may prove difficult because of political pressures. Until these steps are taken, however, differences in a country's approach to various risks to health and to the environment might be challenged as or are to be (WTO The SPS dispute have also ruled that a country's of its level of risk be supported by a risk that assessment must be even scientists have little to predict which foreign species may prove when introduced to a new environment. In the from US the dispute supported by the Appellate Body, noted that the scientific on which the European Communities based their level of risk were in the of they not as the Appellate Body they the potential of the at levels found more or when the are for growth in (WTO p. this level of to a risk assessment for potential plant pests might restrictions on imports by both that a fungus has the potential to damage in the importing country and that the fungus might be on an imported The risk assessment would probably have to address each species or to logs for the Appellate Body that is not is a of A risk the the of or (WTO p. Although the Appellate Body imposed it that the not have to be must it prove that the damage would any (WTO AB-1998-5). Given current levels of scientific knowledge and funding, can APHIS be expected to the likelihood or that any of the of insects, fungi, or plant of which could hitch a ride on any from any of US trading any of the agricultural or natural ecosystems of the United Moreover, the Appellate Body not the that many other potential pests cannot be evaluated at because they are either to or or in their APHIS can apply phytosanitary an organism for control must have been designated a “quarantine must be based on a risk the in and scientific just In practice, for example, APHIS might well be to predict that certain insects on imports of pose a threat to in do scientists have information to how those insects might in natural to the potential for invasion by other species of or pathogens on the same It is that APHIS can these the time to risk that imports of to pose severe pest risks can for several APHIS can the process and impose new For example, APHIS in that it considered solid wood packing to be of the pest of all wood imports (APHIS it its risk assessment regulations only in October APHIS the in The only a country can the to the and its with such is through of provisional measures under the of article In ruling on the US challenge regulations on imports of and the Appellate Body that a measure cannot as provisional the country is seeking the information and will the provisional measure a (Victor 1999). The is in the many in which APHIS with it must either to allow the organism with invasive potential into the it will not prove to impose a provisional on its and to trying to the standards of the SPS agreement. The to for the of information on species may well be to on of it has been determined that pests may be introduced a certain of or its country of APHIS should to the available to that or as as to insects, fungi, and the SPS agreement allow a country to adopt such an safeguard on the of a risk assessment that examines a of pests that might be associated with that and not Although pathway regulation has not yet been at in a the on in the of the agreement and in Appellate Body that such an approach would be found when an organism has been designated a “quarantine the still phytosanitary to ensure that their phytosanitary requirements cause the to trade. In other words, of the most measure to against or a country must accept risk of that and adopt those measures that a level of protection. For example, in the of logs and lumber imported from New Zealand and APHIS the less of alternative measures in to the burden on APHIS with that treatments would be more than with in preventing pest its of by that is to the agricultural and its forest from exotic plant pests, but it also has the ensure international only to the to meet plant protection of plant pest risk to a To this would be considered trade restrictions under and subject to challenge by other trading partners in the World Trade (APHIS p. The SPS agreement and revised IPPC the right of the United States to protect from introduction of the thousands of species of pests and weeds that are natural ecosystems in the country insects, see Niemela and Mattson 1996, APHIS for plants, see and the Plant at more organisms to these species into the country several The the species to the new imports may a in an not and the imported organisms may a that is to control than established from the New Zealand see et al. 1999). the SPS agreement and IPPC allow a country to phytosanitary barriers for pests in the country only when the species is not and an official control program the or when the introduced organism from its in the United States in a that the potential to cause greater which as an control will affect the types and of established pests and weeds against which APHIS can protect US ecosystems from imports. however, the to control programs for more than a few species. A of could for phytosanitary controls at US borders, provided that regulatory and programs are considered control Given the that could result from allowing introductions of established it would be appropriate to all in the of which of are to be official control As noted above, the SPS agreement also governments to of an established pest when the new in from in the However, phytosanitary have been to in their attempts to determine such that can have serious the spread of of disease by several fungi in the which when phytosanitary imports of logs, based on their that the disease only that was in their countries. APHIS policies and procedures to be which may the threat from of the SPS agreement. For example, according to the National Plant Board, APHIS-PPQ risk assessment process not the in the it on which or are Many of the process are (National Plant Board 1999). In response to this APHIS has a of its risk assessment October 1999, the a in the seeking on the and on November 1999, it a the an in risk on a process and noted in APHIS the for with the process to ensure that no is also noted that APHIS too on the of an introduction and too little on the of such an introduction 1999). APHIS is also a to and existing international standards and the current of the APHIS to a with of changes in ensure and The SPS agreement was almost by in trade and not in the new of invasion Under the it is not that the SPS agreement phytosanitary safeguards and the danger of harmful The danger from to heavily on risk when the are the priority to trade protection from biological invasion not the of species and biological subject to its on and a few species than on preventing any introductions the of the differences in risk of associated with shipments from as to producers A for American scientists to the issues raised in this article and to for changes in policies that to pest exclusion In US an Invasive and it with developing for US programs to prevent and to The Invasive should the SPS agreement and IPPC allow countries to adopt phytosanitary programs to the structure in In the APHIS can its pest exclusion program the imposed by the SPS agreement and IPPC by zero which it should appropriate level of protection. Although this new would not “If in doubt, keep it out” or “Guilty until proven as the in it would the to be as as when for example, which organisms should be considered “quarantine As above, APHIS is to its risk assessment assessment may be an appropriate for to set for search and on pests, but the process is too and too to to a scientific for an exclusion