In May, the return on investment of Finnish private forests was
-13.2 percent year-on-year, remaining close to the figures
recorded in April (-13.0%) and March (-13.2%). The year-to-date
investment return improved from 0.8% in April to 2.3% in May.
Over a five-year forest property holding period (from May 2021
to May 2026), the return stood at 5.5% per annum. The annualized
return for 5-year holding has decreased over the past year from
10.2 percent in May 2025 to 5.5 percent in May 2026.
The recent changes in returns were mainly driven by movements in
stumpage prices. While both sawlog and pulpwood prices have
increased steadily during the spring, they remain below the
levels recorded at the same time last year, particularly for
pulpwood.
Following the discontinuation by the Natural Resources
Institute Finland (Luke) of its calculation of the investment
returns for non-industrial private forests (https://www.luke.fi/en/statistics/forestry-as-an-investment-statistics-discontinued/forestry-as-an-investment-2024),
Indufor Oy continues the statistics of the Forest Investment
Return Index based on data produced by Luke. The statistics
concern about 600 000 private forest owners in Finland with a
total forest area of 12.4 million ha. The method is based on the
Montgomery–Vartia index, which allows the return to be
consistently divided into components. Indufor has switched to
using monthly data, which enables more accurate measurement.
As Finnish forests account for about 20% of the EU's timber
market, the yield calculation can be considered indicative on a
broader scale. In addition, the index provides information from
the global international market, which buys more than 70% of the
country's forest industry production.
Founded in 1980, Indufor Oy (www.induforgroup.com) is a globally
renowned expert in forest and natural resource issues with
operations on five continents. The company has served more than
one thousand clients and has field experience from more than a
hundred countries. The company's headquarters are in Helsinki,
Finland, and the company employs more than 60 people.
Source:
sttinfo.fi
