Creating value through advanced silvicultural services

Abstract

A scenario study was used for creating alternative operational environments for wood production in Finland in the future. The most promising research topics in the alternative scenarios were then analyzed and summarized. The alienation of non-industrial private forest landowners from practical forestry, the need to foster entrepreneurship, and the need to improve cost-efficiency in silvicultural service provision were found to be the most important background factors. Also, counteracting the effects of threatening lack of labour for silvicultural works safeguards the future of wood production. Based on these results, theories on creating value through services were applied in order to develop a service chain for stand establishment and management of young stands of Norway spruce. The first step in the service chain was that of quality-guaranteed stand establishment service, where the establishment of a tree stand is sold to the customer as a total service commodity. The idea is that the service provider bears the risk of failure of stand establishment up to a certain stand age. Adequate premiums for covering the risk of failure were calculated. The second step involved looking into the possibilities of classifying established Norway spruce stands according to their potential for emerging need to undergo early tending within six years after planting. Reliable prediction of the need for early tending turned out to be impossible, despite the use of state-of-the-art classification algorithms. The third step was to study the effect of timing of tending on the consumption of working time in young Norway spruce stands. The common problem of great variation between sample plots in time studies was avoided by introducing a new method. Just a brief two-year time span between the alternative timing points of pre-commercial thinning resulted in marked changes in the consumption of working time. The simulated effects on the further development of the stands did not differ much from one another. The effective use of examples of such services, as presented in this study, requires information and communication technology applications for the management of stand and operational information.

Estimating the need for early cleaning in Norway spruce plantations in Finland

“…In comparison to the study of Kiljunen (2004), application of a different approach and use of slightly older plantations did offer some aid in determination of the need for young stand tending from site attributes. Kiljunen (2004) predicted only two need for early tending categories (No, Yes), and the most accurate method for predicting no need for tending, had precision of 45.9% correct.…”

“…The size of the hardwoods removed (basal area at cutpoint) has a strong correlation with young stand management costs (Hämäläinen andKaila 1983, Kaila et al 1999), so the work time needed for cleaning increases as a function of a plantation age (Kaila et al 2006). To sustain good growth of the crop trees and to prevent increased work time, early cleaning should be carried out as soon as necessary but with an attempt to avoid the re-establishment of the removed vegetation (Kiljunen 2006).…”

“…However, the exact dependence of young stand management on site type, stand age, or site preparation method is not so well known. Kiljunen (2004) used machine learning algorithms to predict need for early tending on Norway spruce plantations. The prediction was based on inventory data for three-year-old plantations.…”

“…The prediction was based on inventory data for three-year-old plantations. According to Kiljunen (2004), many site attributes affected the need for early tending, but prediction of the need for an individual stand was poor. However, in that data set, the plantations surveyed were rather young from the standpoint of early cleaning.…”

Effect of soil preparation method on economic result of Norway spruce regeneration chain

“…However, optimal timing of young stand management operations is a multi-dimensional problem (Kaila et al 2006, Kiljunen 2006. Costs of cleanings and pre-commercial thinning arise when density and stump diameter of the removed trees increase (Kaila et al 2006, Metsäalan työe-htosopimus 2008.…”