Investing in Forestry

There is a surplus of wood growing in the world, despite generalizations about highly visible over-harvesting of some species and locations that suggests otherwise. Dealing with the oversupply by excluding natural forests from harvest and investing in intensive plantations is a risky strategy. Plantations require high financial investment, generally produce low quality wood, have a narrow “biological window” when they need harvesting, and put the entire investment at risk if this “window” is missed. Plantations could meet the world's wood needs on about ten percent of the current forest area; however, if the nonplantation forests were harvested, these natural forests could produce less expensive, higher quality timber than plantations and ruin the plantation investment. Alternative strategies for timber investment include increasing global wood demand, targeting high quality wood niches, and managing forests for other uses in addition to wood. Intensive plantations may be profitable in a few situ...