Forestry as an investment 2020

·      In 2020, the investment returns on wood production were 2.6%. Compared with the previous year, the returns increased by 3.3 percentage points, while being 2.7 percentage points lower than the average of the previous five years.

·      The value of the net increment of growing stock accounted for 1.7 percentage points of the returns (0.6 percentage points more than on average in the previous five-year period). Earnings from wood sales had an impact of +3.4 percentage points on the returns, and wood production subsidies an impact of +0.1 percentage points. The decrease in standing sales prices reduced the returns by –1.9 and total wood production costs by –0.6 percentage points. 

·      Studied by region, the returns were highest in Central Ostrobothnia (4.7%) and lowest in Lapland (–2.1%).

·      The impact of the declining standing sales prices on the real investment returns on wood production was negative in nearly all regions. The impact of prices was only positive in Satakunta (+0.6 percentage points), and it was most negative in Lapland (–5.8 percentage points). Net increment had a negative impact on returns in two regions. This means that the value of felled trees was higher than the value of trees that grew in their place.

·      The growing stock calculations for 2017–2020 used the results of the 13th National Forest Inventory (NFI13), which are based on measurements conducted in 2015–2019.

·      In the returns calculation, earnings, costs and the value of net increment are set in proportion to the previous year’s stumpage value calculated on the basis of the timber volumes of standing trees and the stumpage prices of assortments. In 2019, the stumpage value was approximately EUR 51 billion. In 2020, the stumpage value was equally high.

·        The nominal values have been converted into real values using the cost-of-living index.

·        Data from 2018–2020 is preliminary.

Starting from 2017, the growing stock calculation was changed so that the growing stock data from the annually published National Forest Inventory (NFI) data is used as the data for the year in the centre of the five-year measurement period. The tree growth is based on the growth calculated for each assortment based on the NFI data.