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Doctoral thesis2022Open access

Strategic technology decision-making in Swedish large-scale forestry

Jonsson, Rikard

Abstract

Technological development gives Swedish forest companies and forest owners’
associations opportunities to maintain competitiveness in the highly cost-sensitive
market for forest products. Development efforts are typically performed through
unstructured decision processes. However, an organization’s success is a product of
its decisions, so the quality of these decisions is crucial. The main objectives of this
thesis were therefore to describe and critically analyze strategic decision-making
about forest technology. Study I investigated how and with what support forest
companies and a forest owners’ association make decisions about forest technology.
It was concluded that these organizations value collaborations with manufacturers
and researchers, that economic criteria were most important in the decision-making
process, and that large risks are preferably managed in a stepwise fashion. Study II
reviewed the use of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) methods in forest
operations and it was shown that the methods were used at various temporal scales,
most commonly when making strategic decisions. Study III developed and
compared two modelling approaches for machine system analysis and concluded
that they produced similar results despite having different levels of detail and
demanding different competences. Study IV used the previously developed
modelling approaches to compare the performance of established and new machine
systems in Swedish final fellings, revealing an opportunity to reduce costs by
adopting the new machine system. A conceptual flowchart for strategic decisionmaking
on forest technology development was created to improve the quality and
efficiency of the decision-making process.

Keywords

decision processes; forest technology development; information needs; logging costs; machine system comparison; semi-structured interviews; cut-to-length; harwarder; optimization; multi-criteria decision analysis

Published in

Acta Universitatis Agriculturae Sueciae
2022, number: 2022:53
Publisher: Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences

SLU Authors

UKÄ Subject classification

Forest Science

Publication identifier

  • ISBN: 978-91-7760-981-0
  • eISBN: 978-91-7760-982-7

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/118671