Background information

The National Wood Resource and Product Balances workshop was organized by the ECE/FAO Forestry and Timber Section with the support of the Team of Specialists on Forest Products Statistics and the Team of Specialists on Monitoring Sustainable Forest Management.

The target audience of the workshop were national correspondents, responsible for forest and forest products reporting.

The ultimate purpose of the workshop was to reduce inconsistencies in forest and forest products reporting by using forest and wood balances to analyze the consistency of available information on wood resources growth, use and processing, as well as sharing knowledge and best practices among the national correspondents. The workshop was focused on improving the quality of data and analysis in forest and forest products reporting by using National Wood Resource and Product Balances.

Wood resource and product balances are a way to check and improve the accuracy of the basic estimates of forestry and wood-fiber production, to increase the effective use of timber, review the policies and measures concerning increment, and control timber utilization on the basis of sustained yield.

Objectives

Discuss with participants the following issues concerning the national reporting: 

• Share knowledge and best practices to reduce inconsistencies in forest and forest products reporting.
• Use the wood balance to highlight discrepancies between available wood and use of wood (comparing Forest Resources Assessment/Joint Forest Sector Questionnaire) and use this information to reduce inconsistencies.
• Analyse consistency between available information on wood resources growth, use and processing.

Outcomes

During the workshop participants identified inconsistencies in forest and forest product reporting  and potential reasons for these, and  discussed possible solutions at the national level. Participants increased knowledge on use of tools such as Wood Fibre Balance and Forest Balance, which are useful for analysis of consistency between available information on wood resources growth, use and processing. Overall participants discussed ways to improve reporting at the national level. 

Report of the National Wood Resource and Product Balances workshop was produced by ECE/FAO Forestry and Timber Section (PDF).

Presentations

Documents and Results

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions: [email protected] or [email protected] for substantive matters, or [email protected] for organizational matters  .