pine wood nematode aid for timber owners in Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Digi Mart USA News (France): The French government announced on Tuesday an aid program for owners of timber in the Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques departments whose trees were cut and immobilized to fight the pine nematode, a translucent worm less than one millimeter long that pests conifers.
According to a decree published Tuesday in the Journal officiel, the aid compensates owners for the loss of income incurred from November 5, 2025, due to administrative immobilization measures taken to combat Bursaphelenchus xylophilus. The decree states that the amount depends on the difference between the price at which the wood was initially expected to be sold and the final sale price, subject to a cap for each beneficiary.
The available funding totals 200,000 euros, and the procedures are set out in an order published the same day in the Journal officiel. Applications may be submitted until December 15, 2026.
The response began after the first case was detected in Seignosse, at the southern end of the Landes massif, in November 2025. Authorities have been felling pines within an infested zone of 500 meters around contaminated trees and removing dead trees from a 20-kilometer buffer zone.
According to the latest bulletin from the Regional Directorate of Food, Agriculture and Forestry (Draaf) Nouvelle-Aquitaine, published October 29, the delimited zone now covers 461,800 hectares, up from nearly 400,000 in mid-September. Six new contaminations were detected on October 20 and 21 in the communes of Saint-Étienne-d’Orthe (Landes) and Artiguelouve, Biron, Castillon, Cescau and Lons (Pyrénées-Atlantiques).
As of October 28, the bulletin reports that 18,294 identified trees had been felled in forests, along with about forty in gardens, green spaces and vegetated infrastructure. The figures do not include the clear-cutting carried out in the Seignosse infested zone or the destruction of contaminated trees.
