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Review of the forest industry and CTL method

Hannu Kivelä
Director, Strategy and Customer Cooperation
Ponsse Oyj

The Cut-to-length methods increasing for several reasons

Interest in and demand for harvesting with cut-to-length forest machines increased considerably in 2007 and the growth still continues strongly. The increasing demand is attributable to several reasons. North America and Europe make up 80 per cent of the world’s forest machine markets. Particularly
in Europe, the felling volumes have increased and fellings have become mechanised. Both of these trends increase the demand for cut-to-length forest machines. The Russian forest sector is growing fast, and the increased wood prices are targeting investments at effective cut-to-length machines. The spreading of the cut-to-length method on the established markets is attributable to an increasing lack of workforce, especially lumberjacks, as it is difficult to find new workers for hard forest work. As a result, the offer of driver training and maintenance services in the cut-to-length method has reached a level where customers can be rest-assured that the machines will be in working condition and of the required output level. Felling volumes and mechanisation are also increasing globally. New forest industry investments increasingly evolve in places where the entire wood procurement process must be generated out of nothing. The trends increase the overall forest machine market and the share of the cut-to-length method of the markets. The share of fastgrowth planted forests of the global production of industrial wood is increasing all the time. According to Pöyry’s forecast, the area covered by fast-growth planted forests will increase from the present 20 million hectares to some 31 million hectares by the year 2020.