New Zealand Forest Owners Association

Research and devleopment to increase the profitability and export earnings o fthe New Zealand forest growing sector.

This Innovation Plan concerns the forest growing sector and its focus  on excelling in the management of plantation forests to deliver logs andother woody biomass to the downstream processing sectors of the forest industry.

The NZ Forestry Science and Innovation Plan has defined goals that will lead to significant increases in forest productivity of consistent good quality solid wood even without expanding the area under trees. Consequently the sector will be more profitable and environmentally sustainable. This will create opportunities for investment in high-tech sawmilling for domestic and export markets. Although solid wood is the main economic driver of the sector, complimentary industries such as pulp, energy, and panel production will utilise the residues from sawmilling and harvesting operations. New Zealanders will benefit from the range of employment and business opportunities that the sector will generate along with the environmental and recreational services that well-managed forests provide.The big opportunity for the sector and New Zealand is to lift the game in forestry science so that leading-edge research is initiated and step changetechnologies are developed and implemented.