Landowner Learning Series: Large-scale wild fungal inoculation in forestry to improve productivity and carbon sequestration

Around the world, governments and corporations have taken responsibility for addressing the climate crisis and signs of major biodiversity collapse. At the center of this discourse has been forests’ fundamental role in global climate strategy – including timber forests being managed for harvest. However, historically, most working forest landscapes have been managed for one thing: timber. Today, we need to ask ourselves, how do we best manage working forests for timber but also biodiversity and carbon drawdown? Funga has identified an opportunity to align timber, carbon, and biodiversity outcomes. That opportunity lives below our feet, in the soil, in the forest fungal microbiome. Most trees on Earth form a core, symbiotic partnership with fungi on their roots. These fungi are critical to how trees access growth-limiting soil resources, and as such, underpin the health and resilience of entire forest ecosystems. Our research identifies whole communities of native forest fungi directly linked to forest health, tree growth, and carbon capture rates – with Funga bringing to market a first-of-its-kind climate solution powered by below-ground microbiome restoration. Funga’s technologies aim to operationalize this relationship through proprietary DNA sequencing and machine learning technologies that identify and reintroduce real, natural biodiverse fungal communities needed to optimize forest production and reforestation.
Who: Ian Ware, Lead Scientist at Funga, Josh Parrish, Chief Growth Officer at Funga, and Anthony Seliskar, Landowner Engagement Manager at Funga
When: March 14, 2024, 2:00 p.m., ET