Metsä Group has developed an application that uses open spatial datasets and artificial intelligence to assess growing stock. The application enables reliable estimates of growing stock and felling site data for wood trades, even without a forest visit.
Used in connection with wood trade, the application provides increasingly accurate wood trade offers to forest owners. Even though wood trade is conducted based on estimates of growing stock, wood trade income will continue to be based on the exact wood volumes measured by the harvester.
In addition to forest owners, the application benefits forest specialists who purchase wood, as the reduced need for forest visits means they have more time to serve forest owners and provide forestry advice.
When preparing a wood trade offer, the forest specialist draws the felling site on a digital map. The application then determines the site’s key growing stock data such as the percentage of log wood, sturdiness per tree species, quality and diameter distribution.
The AI-based assessment uses open spatial datasets, which are supplemented with measurement data from harvesters and data collected from log measuring devices at Metsä Fibre's sawmills.
The application is the result of Metsä Group's own development work, and it moved from idea to a ready solution in a couple of years. Thanks to machine learning, the accuracy of the algorithms continues to improve.