Factors influencing Norwegian small-scale private forest owners’ ability to meet the political goals

Abstract

Norwegian forest policy has high-level, complex objectives for the products and benefits from the forest, including increased contribution to the climate, preservation of biodiversity, and creation of economic values. In Norway, it is first and foremost small-scale private forest owners who have to deliver on these expanded goals. The article reveals owners' lack of forestry competence, and elaborates on the role of forestry employees (advisers) in owners' decision-making processes, be it forestrycompetent owners or not. There is, however, a decreased number of advisers in the private and public forest services, implying that forest owners are atomised in the meaning of being alone. This type of individualization and an increasing lack of forestry competence among forest owners are a contradiction. The mismatch is serious for the government and the forestry business because it probably hampers the fulfilment of the political objectives. The article presents six options for meeting the obstacles to goal fulfilment. The article is based on two research projects from the counties of Trøndelag and Hedmark. Data were collected between 2002 and 2007 and include survey, focus group interviews, in-depth interviews, fieldwork and document analysis.

Determinants of Nonindustrial Private Forest Owners’ Willingness to Harvest Timber in Norway

“…Forest owners with a previous record of harvesting possess a sense of familiarity with forest policies, and hence have fewer reservations about starting a new activity [79][80][81]. In contrast, forest owners with limited knowledge about the Forest Fund erroneously estimate taxes after timber harvest and the cost of stand establishment after harvesting [12,41,82].…”

Post forest reversal discussion: Restructuring public subsidy system for private forests under the differences of topographic conditions in Norway

“…Norway embraces 24% of productive forest areas (SSB, 2011a), but the forest resources are underutilized because of the weak forestry support system (Follo, 2011). The growing stock of the country increased from 350 million m 3 in 1950 to 800 million m 3 in 2000 (UNECE, 2007) owing to underutilization and afforestation after World War II, and there is a necessity to stimulate production for the purpose of satisfying the domestic energy demand (Eid et al, 2001(Eid et al, , 2010Bolkesjø et al, 2006;Sato, 2010;Bergseng and Solberg, 2007) and contribute to mitigate climate change through tree replanting.…”

A “system dynamics perspective” of bioenergy governance and local, sustainable development

“…On the one hand, these rules might exacerbate ownership fragmentation, ownership type and size (e.g., small and large, and the commons—almenningen), and dispersion of critical activities (e.g., biomass extraction, processing, and transport). On the other hand, it discourages large businesses and multinational companies to embark in a forest‐resources rush in rural areas (Cavicchi, ; Follo et al, ; Lindstad, ; Taylor and Follo, ).…”