Between 2017 and 2019, over 270 million m3 of standing timber in Central Europe has been damaged by a combination of factors, primarily driven by changing climate conditions featuring hotter, drier summers and warmer winters. In combination with frequent windstorms, this has created ideal conditions for the spread of spruce bark beetles, especially at lower elevations. The damage is across many countries, including Poland, Switzerland, Slovakia, Italy, and Sweden, but the most severe losses have been in Germany, the Czech Republic, and Austria.

"The outbreak in these three countries is so severe, " said Russ Taylor, Managing Director at FEA - Canada, "that our analysis predicts that the killed timber volume from the European source bark beetle in Central Europe will eventually exceed that of the B.C. Interior mountain