LATVIJAS VALSTS MEZZINATNES INSTITUTS SILAVA

Their core work

Latvia's leading forest research institute, specializing in sustainable forest management, forest monitoring, and bioeconomy strategies. They provide scientific data on forest resources — from national forest inventories to biomass supply chains — and translate that knowledge into regional development policies. Their work bridges forest science with practical applications like industrial crop production on marginal lands and bio-based value chain development for rural economies.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

Their early H2020 work (2015–2018) was rooted in core forestry science — harmonised forest data, disturbance monitoring, earth observation, and wood supply logistics. From 2017 onward, the focus shifted decisively toward bioeconomy policy and rural development, with emphasis on marginal lands, business models, co-creation, and regional strategy. This reflects a clear move from technical forest data provider to a more policy-oriented bioeconomy advisor.

Silava is moving from pure forest science toward bioeconomy strategy and rural policy advisory, making them increasingly relevant for projects that need to connect natural resource data with regional economic planning.

How they like to work

Silava participates exclusively as a partner, never as coordinator, which is typical for a national research institute contributing specialized forest science expertise to larger European consortia. With 70 unique partners across 28 countries in just 4 projects, they join large, broadly distributed consortia rather than small focused teams. This makes them an accessible partner — experienced in multi-country collaboration and comfortable working within complex project structures.

Despite only 4 projects, Silava has built an impressively wide network of 70 partners across 28 countries, covering most of the EU. This breadth comes from participating in large pan-European research and coordination actions.

What sets them apart

Silava is Latvia's primary forest research institution, offering a rare combination of deep national forest inventory expertise with growing bioeconomy policy capability. For consortium builders, they provide essential Baltic and Northern European forest data that few other organizations can supply. Their evolution from data provider to bioeconomy strategist makes them a two-in-one partner: scientific rigor plus policy translation.

Highlights from their portfolio

• BE-Rural
  Their largest project by funding (EUR 201,248), focused on bio-based regional development strategies — signals their strategic shift toward bioeconomy policy.
• DIABOLO
  Pan-European forest inventory harmonisation project that directly built on Silava's core competence in national forest monitoring and data products.