Case Studies
The objective of the case studies (WP8000) was to test the practical implementation of the FlexWood concept in cooperation with forest industry partners in Europe, and thus demonstrate its relevance. Demonstrations were arranged in four European countries representing different forest types and ownership structures as well as different forest use practices: France, Germany, Sweden and Poland.
France
In France efforts were coordinated to translate the FlexWood concept into an integrated set of tools for harvest planning in cultivated maritime pine forest. More precisely, the study case was centered on one of the problematics supply companies have to deal with daily: how to decide on the best harvesting instructions to cut demanded round wood products from an available set of blocks (standing timber).
Germany
In the framework of FlexWood the German use case was designed to represent the typical structures of Central European multifunctional forest management systems: mixed uneven stands with a significant proportion of broadleaf trees, limited and not standardized conventional inventory procedures and results and a diverse structure of wood industry, represented namely by small to medium size saw mills and bioenergy utilization. Furthermore in the FlexWood context, special emphasis was given to a detailed description of industry-relevant round wood and log characteristics (dimensions and quality features) and the possibilities to derive them from advanced remote sensing and information technology.
Poland
The specifics of the domestic wood market significantly influenced the implementation of the Polish use case. The main domestic supplier of wood in Poland for many years now continues to be the State Forests National Forest Holding. The wood it offers is sold to a large extent (90-95% of volume) through various online auctions. Potential buyers bid on auctioned lots of wood of specifically defined quality and dimension parameters. Due to this fact, the Polish use case focused primarily on an assessment of the usefulness of the idea proposed in the FlexWood project, especially the new techniques and technologies used to perform forest inventories and pre-harvest assessment.
Sweden
In the Swedish use case, the aim was to improve the operational planning process by improving the data quality describing the forest, the tools for yield simulation and also the choice of stands according to industry demand, the value of the wood and processing costs. The aim of the project was also to evaluate how a tool for operational planning that includes scheduling can enhance adaptations to industrial demand and how the input data in the system can affect the choice of stands. An additional aim was to investigate whether the forecasts can be improved through the higher accuracy and precision of forest inventory data.