BeonNAT at REPOM 2021 Conference

On June 3rd Steffi Schillem presented the concept of the field trials at the 3rd International Conference Forest and Landscape Restoration of Post-mining Sites (REPOM), Prague (online)

One of the main targets of BeonNAT is the research and selection of underutilized species with the potential to generate organic products under severe ecological requirements and a suitable chemical composition. The harvested (wild and cultivated) species will be the source of biomass utilized by the different companies within the BeonNAT project consortium for the processing and production of the new bio-based products like essential oils, bioplastics for packaging, paper manufacturing, biochar and active carbon production.

Field trials in Spain, Romania and Germany (2 test sites per country) will be established to test the benefit of intercropping/mixed-forest in marginal cultural land versus the natural growing/monoculture on quality and quantity of biomass. Investigations on soil conditions, cultivation, biodiversity and harvesting techniques will be carried out. In this conference Steffi presented one of the test sites in Germany. This is a reclamation site characterized by very sandy substrates being almost free of organic matter, with extremely low nutrient contents and an annual precipitation of only 570 mm and lower. Furthermore, the overall concept of the field trial design and the investigations on biomass development, the impact on soil fertility and biodiversity after planting were explained