At the turn of the year, but in any case in spring 2024, the official draft law on the new German Federal Forest Act. The individual paragraphs are then discussed and reworded in committees, expert panels and in the Bundestag before the whole thing is passed as law. Biker regulars' tables are not consulted on this, but in order to at least be able to have a well-founded say on social media platforms, it is a good idea to know a few facts and figures about the German forest. And there really are a few curiosities. Let's start with the bare figures:
1. how much forest is there in Germany?
- On a total land area of 35,720,780 hectares, 11.4 million hectares of forest grow. This means that 32 per cent of Germany consists of forest (as of the last Federal Forest Inventory in 2012).
- Bavaria has by far the largest share of this forest area: 2.61 million hectares.
- The largest contiguous forest area in Germany is the Palatinate Forest: 180,000 hectares.
- The climate protection effect of the German forest: it filters 62 million tonnes of CO2 from the air every year (not to mention its cooling effect and its functions as a dust filter, species conservation area, recreational value, water reservoir, wood supplier, etc.).
2 Who owns the German forest?
48 per cent of the forest is privately owned, 29 per cent belongs to the federal states, 19 per cent to corporations (e.g. municipalities, churches) and 4 per cent is owned by the federal government.
3. almost half of Germany's forests are in private hands - who are the owners?
There are a total of 1.8 million private owners in Germany. These include private individuals, but also companies and foundations. Accordingly, the forest is fragmented and divided into small parcels. The largest private owner is the Thurn und Taxis family with 20,000 hectares. It would be pointless to list all the owners with a larger share by name. Especially as the online site www.wald-prinz.de has already gone to this trouble. The list is long and not only reads like a gallery of Kaiser Wilhelm's ancestors, it is.
A brief history refresher: the November Revolution of 1918 led to the fall of the monarchy in Germany. In the Weimar Republic that followed, the nobility lost all their privileges, but were allowed to keep their names and property. As a result, former aristocratic families still own the forests today. These properties were divided up further and further as they were passed on to several heirs.
But before you start feeling social envy - think again: do you have the time and inclination to spend your free time dealing with issues such as climate change, bark beetles, forest fires, storm damage, game quotas, trail maintenance, traffic safety, removal of "untypical forest hazards" and so on? For a piece of forest that belongs to you, but where everyone has free access rights?
Anyone who has now shouted "Yes, I would take all that on myself!": You can buy and/or bid for woodland at www.wald-boerse.de. For example, a one-hectare mixed forest in the Wiehengebirge (near Bielefeld) could be bought there for 30,000 euros.
4. the latest headline-grabbing forest sale
Last August, Michael-Benedikt Prince of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach sold an old family estate of 2,400 hectares of forest in Thuringia. This corresponds to an area the size of 3445 football pitches. Although the responsible municipality of Schwallungen had the right of first refusal for the Zillbach forest, it was unable to match the price, which was far above the market value. As a result, the contract was awarded to Swiss Post for an alleged 70 million euros.
And what does Swiss Post want to do with a piece of forest in Thuringia? Switzerland has declared that it wants to be climate-neutral by 2050, whereas Swiss Post wants to achieve this by 2040. 90 per cent of this will be achieved through its own efforts and the remaining 10 per cent through "offsetting measures". Is this greenwashing? Nature conservation organisations say: yes!
An example that will hopefully not set a precedent. Because if the new Forest Act really is as restrictive for forest owners as it is outlined in the unauthorised published draft bill, many a forest owner could come up with the same idea: Simply sell the age-old family property to the highest bidder - problem solved.
5 How much forest does Deutsche Bahn own?
Deutsche Bahn also owns almost 20,000 hectares of forest in the country and employs 1,000 foresters for this purpose alone. However, this large total area is limited to narrow strips of forest to the right and left of the national railway tracks. In the days of the steam locomotive, these strips were mostly cleared because of the danger of flying sparks and forest fires. Today, the railway foresters are supposed to take care of the half-height vegetation near the tracks so that no trees can fall onto the tracks during storms. So much for the theory.
6 The largest clear-cutting in history
Even during and especially after the Second World War, German forests were literally plundered. Of course, a lot was destroyed by the bombs and a lot of wood was also needed for reconstruction. However, the clear-cutting was necessary for the reparations payments to England and France. The rest was done by the bark beetle, which was already present in large numbers at the time. The subsequent reconstruction of these forests is considered a significant cultural achievement and was even honoured with a coin: the 50 pfennig coin printed from 1949 showed a woman planting an oak tree.
7. the largest tree in the country
Germany's tallest tree is a Douglas fir. It was planted as a three-year-old tree near Freiburg im Breisgau in 1913 and is now over 67 metres tall (last measured in 2019). Its name: Waldtraut vom Mühlwald. Incidentally, the tallest tree in the world is a coast redwood in California's Redwood National Park (115.55 metres).
Gitta Beimfohr
Editor
