Introducing mass timber to Gabon
Marina Tower, Gabon
Working alongside the Strategic Investment Fund of Gabon (FGIS) and Façade Maritime du Champ Triomphal (FMCT), to support the development of The Gabon Sovereign Wealth Tower. This Tower will be a flagship mass timber building in Gabon to offer a template for construction in a CSFE. The opportunity to use a building to develop a nuanced understanding of a CSFE that can inform national-level strategy is exciting.
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The expansion of unsustainable industrial logging to meet the demand for low-cost timber has become a major threat to the Congo Basin. The Basin now experiences the deforestation of about 500,000 hectares of forest a year. Of the 200 million hectares of land covered by forests in the basin only 2.5% are currently under sustainable forest management. The urban population of central Africa is expected to more than double by 2050. The consequent demand for materials such as wood is already increasing the number of logging concessions given out within the Basin.
Unless addressed soon, deforestation and forest degradation due to unsustainable resource consumption will deplete the world’s second-largest tropical forest. Gabon is a leader in increasing legal mandates for the protection and sustainable use of forests. In addition to being carbon positive, the country has also made commitments to cut all GHG emissions by 50% by 2025. Capitalizing on Gabon’s existing investments in forest protection and recent goals to diversify its economy, the Gabon Sovereign Wealth Tower project aims to initiate the creation of a CLT value chain that emphasizes sustainable harvesting and regeneration of forest assets.
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MARINA TOWER'S CARBON IMPACT ACROSS THE 3S FRAMEWORK
SINK
STORAGE
SUBSTITUTION
Carbon modelling for this BI is still ongoing, results coming soon
CSFEP's ROLE
Ensuring the timber is sourced sustainably, through a transparent supply chain
Assessing the required social, ecological, and environmental safeguards
Analysing the carbon impact across the 3S (sequestration, storage, and substitution)
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MARINA TOWER'S ENVISIONED IMPACT
This initiative is generating insights on opportunities and challenges for realizing a climate-smart forest economy in Gabon, barriers to scaling up this approach, and how these may be addressed based on the development of the Tower.
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For FGIS and FMCT, the initiative is providing support to ensure the timber is sourced sustainably through a transparent supply chain, analyze the carbon impact across the 3S (sink, storage, and substitution), assess the required safeguards, and understand the role of local communities, particularly in job creation.