Inputs of anthropogenic mercury (Hg) to the environment have led to accumulation of Hg in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, contributing to fish Hg concentrations well above the European Union standards in large parts of Fennoscandia. Forestry operations have been reported to increase the concentrations and loads of Hg to surface waters by mobilizing Hg from the soil. This summary of availabl...

The trade relationship between small-scale growers and processing companies often plays an important role in determining the nature and extent of benefi ts derived from commercial forestry, and the distribution of these benefi ts. Many strategies are used by individual small-scale growers, village communities, companies and government agencies to form partnerships to undertake commercial forest...

Forestry has contributed many problems to the Operations Research (OR) community. At the same time, OR has developed many models and solution methods for use in forestry. In this article, we describe the current status of research on the application of OR methods to forestry and a number of research challenges or open questions that we believe will be of interest to both researchers and practit...

Mercury (Hg) is an element of major concern in boreal freshwater ecosystems, due to high concentrations of Hg in fish. Forestry operations have been reported to increase the concentrations and loads of Hg to surface waters. In this thesis a series of catchment-scale experiments were used to determine forestry effects on total mercury (THg) and methyl mercury (MeHg) runoff concentrations caused ...

The Darwinian concept of evolution provides a usef3 theoretical construct to consider the ongoing development of forest management and forest operations. For example, changing environments, “survival of the fittest”, and random mutation are processes, which have analogs within the forestry arena. The success and survival of any forest operations technology is determined by how well it meets the...

The term “Precision Forestry” is being used more frequently in the forest products industry. This paper defines two broad categories of precision forestry as 1) using geospatial information in forest management and planning, and 2) site-specific silvicultural operations. One case study is presented for site-specific application of herbicides and fertilizers in herbaceous weed control activities...

An important problem for forestry in-field chipping operations is the efficient daily truck transportation of chips from different coupes being harvested, with known supplies, to customer destinations with known daily demands. This paper presents initial results from a trial with FastTRUCK, a software tool that uses a simulated annealing approach to optimise truck schedules. The software was de...