We are witnessing a dramatic moment for humanity and, at the same time, it seems that many have not yet awakened to criticality. The effects of climate change are undeniably felt by everyone, regardless of agreement with the origin, reasons and causative agent.

There are those who claim that it is a natural planetary process, which repeats itself in cycles, others who point to solar heating and the amplitude of its storms, many others that it is a change caused by habits, consumption and human actions. However, there is a link that brings together the different beliefs about climate change: the great intensity and speed that occurs is a factual threat to the survival of life on Earth.

Researchers and scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an organization created within the United Nations that brings together researchers and scientists from various countries to monitor and seek consensus on climate change, recommend that it is necessary to reduce 45% of greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, to avoid raising the planet's temperature above 1.5 degrees Celsius. To alleviate this surprising pace, it is also undeniable that humanity's behaviors, processes, decisions and habits need to adapt and can exert a significant influence on mitigating, reducing and adapting to the changes felt and mapped.

We learned in the first years of elementary school that, here very synthetically, vegetables are carbon sinks, they absorb carbon, convert it into the energy necessary for their survival, fix it in their mass and in the soil and release oxygen as a result. In this simple way, and given this alarming context, we see that cultivated and conserved forests are fundamental to reducing the carbon intensity in the Earth's atmosphere. It is, here, exactly at this point that the growing relevance that tree planting has taken on begins (or continues), and in this scenario, the prominence that Brazil has due to its different numbers in this activity.

The versatile Brazilian forestry agroindustry has, in recent years, presented significant results in terms of business volume with the increase in global demand for products that can replace materials of fossil and non-renewable origin. And I believe that we are only at the beginning of this increase in demand, as habits and decisions are not yet at the speed and sense of urgency that the climate demands.

We still perceive a lethargy on the part of political and institutional decision-makers, which is only justified by the always unbalanced attachment to power and capital, however, this time, they just cannot save us. Growing opportunities are knocking on the forestry sector's door, but they are still taken advantage of by a few awakened people. They have already understood that the new environment that is taking shape in front of us makes businesses viable that were unimaginable until yesterday, and that can even replace in terms of profitability and volume, what motivated the emergence of companies.

If the reader allows me, here I call climate forestry management the new model that I recommend to be adopted by companies that wish to combine longevity, versatility and profitability with climate governance. Regardless of what has been practiced today, such as financial incentives, the adoption of practices and projects that generate socio-environmental benefits, such as carbon credits, green debentures, among others, companies that have already included what I call carbon governance in their strategy have already realize that current forest management needs to change to make the benefits viable.

It is not enough to plant forests as we learned decades ago. How to plant, manage, harvest, use and take advantage of what nature teaches us makes the factual difference in the alliance between the removal and fixation of carbon by forests and the productivity and multiplicity of uses of wood.

The climate forestry management to which I refer objectively combines consortium and symbiosis between cultivated trees and conserved trees, practices regeneration, restoration and reforestation in synergy, understands and positively exploits soil microbiology aimed at production and better carbon fixation in the soil and trees, plans planting and harvesting cycles to maintain a positive balance of emissions, acts intelligently with other agricultural crops and does not allow residues in its processes that cannot be reused, recovered and even sold as a new business (in fact, very profitable).

Changes in forest management are pressing and require a new professional profile that broadens the vision of the possibilities of the scope of our agro-industrial dynamics. The investment, not only financial, but in learning, exchange of experiences, innovation, research, partnerships, especially in the sciences that refer to the rapprochement with which wise nature already practices, in alignment with the new tools that boost our speed and reach, such as artificial intelligence, the internet of things, behavioral neurosciences and human response already give an advantage to those who will excel in solutions to current problems. But it will no longer be the valued and pursued advantage that is only economic and political, as we have seen so far. Those that also bring benefits to our quality of life and environmental well-being will be distinguished and valued.

The forestry agroindustry has a very peculiar difference in global climate governance. By offering the expansion of commercial plantations combined with conservation, practically in identical proportions, resulting from climate forestry management, we are, perhaps, one of the few agents that can neutralize a significant portion of global greenhouse gas emissions. However, it is urgent to change the thinking and orientation of those who have not yet understood that, in order to take advantage of this competitive advantage, it is time to roll up their sleeves and work tirelessly as a multidisciplinary team in search of new ways of producing and making wood available (with lots of carbon stored) for a growing bioproducts industry. In this awakening process, it is crucial to get out of the victimistic, pessimistic and controversial discourse.

I still see many professionals, and even companies en masse, just lamenting why our sector does not have as much social and political “prestige” as it deserves, why our productivity is falling, why the party, A or B has come to power, while our businesses wait for action. Not that I disagree that there are many problems and difficulties faced, but regret alone won't make the slightest difference. I miss it and I aim to awaken in my actions more attitudes, promotion of partnerships, real development of forestry in the new century. The market is heading towards consolidations and groupings of forces for survival, but those who find the key to the change and deliver, in a differentiated and holistic way, the results that we are accustomed to today, will be more admirable and, certainly, more profitable, breathing much more air adequate, inclusive.