Fraunhofer Representative Office Beijing
Harnessing AI to Fight Global Deforestation

© Thünen Institute

The new European Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is intended to prevent goods marketed in the EU from contributing to the spread of deforestation. When a wood product is brought into the EU market, for example, there must be documentation of which types of wood were used to produce it, along with proof of their legal origin. Depending on the material, even the initial review of the declared type of wood is no easy task. Paper, for example, requires time-consuming examination by specialists. Now, a new AI-based analytical tool for determining wood types is being developed to simplify and accelerate this process. Researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics ITWM are working closely with the Thünen Institute of Wood Research to develop the automated image recognition system for large-scale review of declarations of wood type.

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