The Caucasian Fir is Europe’s
favourite yuletide tree – it is beautiful, house-friendly, not sticky, and its
pine needles are softer than other species and less likely to fall off.
Otherwise known as Nordmann Fir or Abies-Nordmanniana,
the Caucasian Fir is a tall evergreen native tree in the Caucasian mountains (Investor.ge,
December-January 2013/14). It was named after Alexander von Nordmann, a Finnish
biologist who studied the tree in the nineteenth century.
A representative of Fair Trees, based
in Denmark and the only Fair Trade certified Christmas tree grower, said that
Georgia dominates the niche market in Christmas trees. However, Georgia does
not export fully-grown trees. Instead, it sells seeds from the Caucasion Fir to
growers abroad, who plant them in their local nurseries. These seeds account
for 90% of the estimated 45 million Christmas trees sold every year in Western
Europe, according to Fair Trees. Denmark is Europe’s largest exporter of
yuletide trees, supplying 7 million per annum on average.
In 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC)
conducted a feasibility study into the potential of Caucasian Fir farming in
Georgia, at the request of the Georgian government’s sovereign fund, the
Partnership Fund. The study revealed that Georgia has cheap and available land
and labour, in addition to the Caucasian Fir seeds, but it lacks the capital
and the knowledge of fir tree farming which requires high-tech horticulture. In
addition, the time needed for a production cycle – from seed harvesting to tree
farming and export – is seven to nine years, which is a deterrent for small
investors.
Europe has a mature market and Denmark
itself is estimated to double its production in Christmas trees in the next 10
years. For Georgia to enter the competitive market won’t be easy. Europe has
fir farms the size of 500 hectares. There is also a strict phyto-sanitary regulation
for importing live plants into the European Union, although local and foreign
companies have exported live plants and seeds to EU from Georgia in the past. Nevertheless,
the PwC study highlighted the market for live Christmas trees is limited due to
supply shortages. The main competition comes from artificial trees (mainly
produced in China), although Georgian trees would be cheaper.
The study claimed that Georgia could
improve their Caucasian Fir seed collection, but that won’t be easy either. Georgia
has approximately 130,000 hectares of forests available for licencing if it
takes on the commercialization of fir trees. But in 2009 the body that
regulated forestry management was abolished. Companies are still required to
apply for a licence, but inspections are conducted only following specific
complaints to the Ministry of Environment, despite companies’ requests for
legislative changes in forest monitoring, taxation, and licencing.
Collecting the seeds can be dangerous.
The best trees grow in Racha in the Caucasus mountains of western Georgia,
where trees grow to 60 metres and the best pine cones are at the top of the
trees. Cone pickers need to collect 10 kilograms of cones to make one kilogram
of seeds. And there is a narrow window of time to collect the cones – only two
weeks in September for harvesting. At such time, the competition to collect
cones is intense, and pickers come from all over the country.
In the 1960s European fir tree farmers
travelled to Georgia to study the tree and developed the business of seed
trading between Europe and Soviet Russia. Nowadays, Fair Trees is interested in
improving the conditions for cone pickers in Racha to make this a viable business
option to ensure that the Caucasian Fir produces many more yuletide trees.
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