Databases and knowledge on tropical wood species

Last update: 8 March 2023

In order to meet the development needs of tropical countries for fuel wood / round wood / timber supplies, protect natural forests and limit harvesting pressure on their natural resources, it is necessary to make better use of forest product diversity and of wood resources. Constructing a reliable and interactive database including the basic properties of these products is key to the success of such an operation. One of the first aims of this database is to analyse relationships between wood properties and uses of tropical timbers, in order to optimize the exploitation of tropical forest resources. These data constitute a reference tool for all research conducted on tropical timber.

Tropical wood data & knowledge bases receive inputs from the different laboratories of the Research Unit (physics, mechanics, chemistry, natural durability and preservation) since they came into being (1929). These labs have determined the technological characteristics of more than 1,200 tropical and Mediterranean timber species, corresponding to thousands of series of tests. These results are now available through several applications, some of which are easily accessible and usable by the researchers of our Unit and by our scientific partners.

The data and knowledge bases are built according to disciplines; data from different origins can be crossed via a log identification code, botanical species or origin.

The laboratories of the Unit supply new inputs to the bases on an ongoing basis as part of:

  • Systematic qualification tests
  • Expertise and consulting projects directly related (or not) to the study of wood variations

Methodological research contributes to improving the quality and relevance of data:

  • Protocol for determination of the Fibre Saturation Point (FSP)
  • Comparative analysis of test methods to determine hardness
  • Sampling procedures for wood specimens

The leadership position of CIRAD’s tropical wood database is mainly due to the uniformity of the data and information gathered on a wide range of species from all tropical countries. Nowadays, these databases can be considered as reference tools for a great deal of research work, especially in the field of wood suitability for applications and studying relationships between technological characteristics.

Last update: 8 March 2023