RAHC Awarded 2025 USDA Forest Service Wood Innovations Grant
The Real American Hardwood Coalition (RAHC) will receive $275,000 in funding under the 2025 USDA Forest Service Wood Innovations Grant program as part of an $80 million, nationwide investment to promote forest health and support rural communities through expansion and innovation of markets for timber and wood products.
A robust forest industry with strength in every sector of the supply chain provides the infrastructure to implement management practices that sustain and improve the health of national, state, and private forestlands and associated rural communities across the U.S.
For the past 25 years, consumption of U.S. hardwood lumber has decreased by more than 75 percent, due in large part to competition from unsustainably sourced and produced “wood-look” building, remodeling, and furnishing materials that have gained market share by misleading the public about the perceived benefits of non-wood products.
With this USDA Forest Service funding, the Real American Hardwood Coalition will educate, inspire, and mobilize architects, designers, and builders in the awareness and utilization of U.S. hardwoods by creating and updating continuing education offerings on sustainable hardwood products, biophilic design, and hardwood cross laminated / mass timber applications, and by hosting a series of hardwood design / build contests for architect and design students in cooperation with U.S. universities.
This funding also will allow the RAHC to further the development of public awareness messaging relative to sustainability—specifically the connection between science-based working forest management and sustainable manufacturing, and how those practices are facilitated and furthered by public demand for Real American Hardwood® products.
“On behalf of the RAHC Board of Directors, we appreciate the USDA Forest Service for acknowledging the role of vibrant markets in supporting sustainable forest management,” said Dallin Brooks, chairman of the RAHC Board. “We look forward to deploying this funding to promote increased utilization of domestically sourced and manufactured hardwood products.”
As noted by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, the Trump Administration is “…investing in innovation that ensures a steady, sustainable supply of American wood that not only supports jobs and fuels economies, it protects the people and communities we serve, as well as the forest resources they depend on to survive and thrive.”
For more information on RAHC, please visit RealAmericanHardwood.com.
