Okrogli les

A “machinery ring” describes an association where farmers support each other by offering machinery and services in forestry and agriculture:
The “machinery ring” is a community that exchanges experiences, shares machines and supports in emergency situations.
it’s essentially based on community and innovation
The „machinery ring“ is a Germany-wide organisation; membership is completed in the members’ local machinery ring (place of living)
The focus is on a member organization and the sustainable benefits for the associated companies

The “machinery ring” successfully offer their members:
reduced production costs attractive employment and additional income opportunities
enhanced working conditions (for example outsourcing of work chains, support of employees during peak periods)
allowances in emergency situations (damages, etc.)
expert consultancy, wide range of services, mediation contracts

The “machinery rings” are the first consulting partners in management and field work organization
The local organizations provide individual personnel, services and technology
The cost-effective shared use of modern technology / machinery in forestry and agriculture, employment models for members and organization of value chains especially in rural areas are the main building blocks
In Germany there are about 240 local machinery ring organizations that represent about 192.000 agricultural farms
Roof organization is the “Bundesverband der Maschinenringe e.V.“ with it’s subsidiary „Maschinenring Deutschland GmbH“

As described in §15 BWaldG forestry associations are “renowned forest management cooperatives, forest management federations and renowned forestry unions”. Also, forest owner associations and forest farmer associations are rated among forestry associations.
Associations are supposed to improve the management in the affiliated forest areas and in the estates selected for afforestation. Especially they should help to overcome the disadvantages of small areas, unfortunate area shapes of ownership fragmentation, conflict situations, insufficient forest development or other lacks of structure (§16 BWaldG).

 Due to the changing structure in forest ownership, a growing demand for wood and the effects of climate change, forestry associations have to face new challenges.
More personnel with expertise is needed to implement the growing amount of forestry measures needed due to climate change
Forestry association need to improve their competitiveness on the market and their ability to establish a working network for timber harvest and marketing of the affiliated forests. Especially, this is important to support forest owners with very small forests, whose transaction costs are usually too high to make harvesting profitable

A forestry association needs to enable a considerable improvement in the management of the affiliated estates regarding size, location and connection (§18 subsection 1 BWaldG).
Forest owner assocations in Bavaria are leading in whole Germany in terms of high educated staff, organization, IT-systems and efficiency.

Training and education center for private and corporate forests and all people interested in the forest
The WBS supports forestry associations in creating their structures and fulfilling their tasks
The WBS is the responsible authority, cross-company training facility and examination location for the apprenticeable profession forester
The WBS is an event location for institutions and federations. Falconers and hunters take their examination there
The WBS is certified for DIN EN ISO 9001 and 14001 as well as OHSAS 18001
All working processes and the content of the education is continuously being improved

An institution like the Bayerische Waldbauernschule is an essential asset to establish an innovative and learning culture in the area of forest owners and association. Furthermore it contributes to more safe and efficient forest operations for the whole area.

The environmental impact of all measures and the security standards suggested in the trainings are constantly being improved and environmentally friendly measures are conveyed to the attendees

Many forestry associations offer so called “forest management contracts”. Together with the forester of the regarding forestry association forest owners can regularly plan the necessary silvicultural actions.

This is an interesting approach especially for old forest owners who can´t any more take care. Furthermore it is an opportunity also for the new forest owner generation with high percentage living far away from the estate.

The state forester is looking after all actions after the forest owner’s decisions and after the accounting (income and expenses). Costs for a forestry management contract depend on the services agreed on in the contract.

The funding of forestry was further developed with following funding schemes FORSTZUSR 2015, FORSTWEGR 2016 and WALDFÖPR 2018

Forestry advisors from the Office for Food, Agriculture and Forests can help if questions occur and offer support for the application process. The Bavarian forest funding process is highly developed.

FORSTZUSR 2015: Guideline for funding project related actions of forestry associations:
Initiatives of the associations to improve professional information, trainings and the mobilization of their members or rather the recruiting of new members were included as new measurements in the funding catalogue
The funding of reliable approaches such as the comprehensive forest management contracts is being intensified
FORSTWEGR 2016: Guideline for funding for actions to access forests:
It is easier and cheaper to transport wood on forest roads which are capable of carrying heavy duty vehicles
Forest paths make it easier to supervise forests more regularly and to fight calamities such as forest fires or parasite infestations
WALDFÖPR 2018: Guideline for funding for financial contributions: Comprehensive Catalogue about silviculture and actions which can be funded with government funds

The ownership of the forests is shared by the stockholders as an historically rooted legal framework. Due to different backgrounds in formation, there is no relation between the size of community forests and the number of stockholders.
The four cornerstones of the community forest law from 1975 are:
All stockholders are part of a public corporation, the forest cooperative
It is forbidden so dissolve forest areas which are part of a community forest
Consistent management policies for all kinds of community forests
The possibility to merge forest cooperatives or create new ones

For the creation of the community forest law in 1975, an advisory board with participants from all existing forms of community forests was formed. Because if this involvement the framework is well accepted and has proved its practicability. Since the implementation of the community forest law until 2002 only two new forest cooperatives have been founded. It is not easy to convince private forest owners to make this step

There are several advantages of community forests compared to small private forests:  
a chairman can decide for all members how to manage the forest, especially after calamities such as a storm
merger of forest cooperatives and newly founded cooperatives improve the forest ownership structure

In the program “rural area” 2007 until 2013 followiing weaknesses were found in NRW:
High share of small scale private forests
Associations to reduce structural disadvantages often too small
Unfavorable age class proportion of the forests due to historical reasons
Logging potential is not being used
Therefore following measures were implemented:
Increase of the value added in forestry products (ELER-Code 123-B)
Forestal road construction (ELER-Code 125-B)
Natura 2000 – Forest (ELER-Code 224)
Forest restructuring (ELER-Code 227)
Soil liming (ELER-Code 227)
Environmental protection (ELER-Code 227)

The funding in general was suitable to support reaching the goals. But due to the small amount of funding the effect of the projects on the state NRW was limited. So future funding should concentrate more on finding solutions for problems caused by the small-scale structure of the forests and on finding more sales opportunities.

ELER-Code 123-B:
Number of jobs could be increased, but the goals could not be reached (40 more jobs, goal: 100 more jobs)
Gross value added was higher than before the project
ELER-Code 125-B:
Amount of harvested wood could be increased from 356.000 m³ to 536.000 m³ due to road construction and costs for logging & logging distance could be decreased
ELER-Code 227:
Long-term improvement of the biodiversity in the forests due to restructuring can be expected
Slightly positive effect on biodiversity through soil liming can be expected (increases stability of the forests)
ELER-Code 224:
As part of the Natura 2000 funding, the following requirements had to be fulfilled: Support of habitat-typical rejuvenescence

Forest consolidation is seen as a solution instrument for the fragmentation of small private forests in Bavaria. The focus of this project: perspectives for the involved authorities, professionals, communities and forest owners. Furthermore, the establishment and development processes as well as the evaluation of the forest consolidations from the perspective of the involved stakeholders was qualitatively analyzed in thee case studies

 For forest consolidations the following actions are recommended:
If possible: increased implementation of the voluntary exchange of land
Use of successful examples in structural improvement activities as role models when new forest consolidations are initiated
Keep the duration of the procedure as short as possible
Intensive cooperation of the involved authorities
Planning and implementation of the forest consolidation adjusted to the situation and with special attention on key activities

Regarding the effect of forest consolidation on the mobilization of wood the following conclusions are drawn:
The effect of forest consolidation on the size of the property is only limited
Forest consolidation can help forest owners with strong forest owner motives to manage their forests how they want to and thereby increase the use of wood and intensify marketing activities
Relationships to the forestry communication network (becoming a member of forestry associations, getting advice from forest administration) are being intensified or created
Forest administration and forestry associations need to get connected to forest owners and support them throughout the forest consolidation to create trust

Goal of the project was to improve the flow of information and of material in the timber supply process of the forestry associations (WBVs) Traunstein, Rosenheim and Holzkirchen. The following objectives were defined: Creation of an integrative model to increase the competitiveness of all stakeholders in the value-added chain (forest owner, WBVs, contractors, haulers, consumers of wood) Evaluation of different timber harvest chains in the frame of an actual state analysis based on important logistic indicators (i.a. lead times, accounting periods) Recording of organizational structures and of the technical equipment of the WBVs for the identification of the business process flow The study showed that especially in small private forests a clear process coordination is needed to fulfill customer demands while at the same time reducing idle time à consequent use of modern information and communication technology is very essential. In the implementation phase, changes were measured in two models: regional thinning events and the integration model. In the regional thinning events the following changes were recognized: The goal of a timber stack size of 50 m³ obs could not be reached, in fact, it even decreased to a size below the size of the actual state analysis The share of highly mechanized harvesting methods in total logging increased from 28 % to 37 % (goal: 35 %) The lead time could be reduced from 49 to 38 days (goal: 35 days) The accounting time (end of transport until final billing) could be reduced from 39 to 25 days (goal: 30 days) due to the installation of 4 EDP-inferfaces with customers (goal: 5 interfaces)

In 2008, Regional Forest Owner Days were held in 7 different locations, namely Kempten, Grub/Bamberg, Lohr, Ansbach, Traunstein, Bad Kötzting and Röhrnbach.
The events consisted of three conceptionally independent parts. Except from scientific speeches concerning the topic forest management, in nearly all locations there was also a professional exhibition. The target group of the forest owners therefore was addressed in a multidimensional way: with knowledge, experiences and leisure offerings.

·         Owners of very small forests could be interested in the regional forest owner days with personal invitations in cooperation with agricultural associations
The success rate of the invitations to the event altogether was 15 %
The visitors of the event most prominently remembered the exhibition, these memories exceeded the memories of the stage play and the speeches

Concerning the impact of the forest owner days on the changes in taking action of the forest owners, a dissertation found that those forest owners who were already organized in forestry associations engaged a little more in their forests after the event than those who were not members of forestry associations. They reacted faster after the event, followed contacts straight forward, took action faster in their forests and were generally more active.