Productive forest land

There are 23.5 million hectares of productive forest land in Sweden, equivalent to 58% of the land area. Data presented here are all productive forest land including or outside formally protected areas.

Evergreens dominant - but broadleaves are increasing
As for all forest land in Sweden, productive forest land is dominated by evergreen forests (82%) with scots pine the most common stand type (40 %). Worth noting is that the exotic species Lodgepole pine accounts for 2% of the productive forest land area, and this proportion in southern Norrland is almost 5%. Since the midddle of the 1980's the area of broadleaved dominated forest has increased in all regions except northern Norrland. Since 1985 and seen for the whole country the area of broadleaved dominated forest has increased from 6 to 9%.

Thinning stage forest is the most common
Maturity class is a classification of the forest from a forestry perspective. The dominant maturity class in productive forest land in Sweden is thinning stage forest (41%) and 32% has reach the minium age for final felling. 6% of the productive forest area is thicket stage of which 80% is artificially regenerated and the rest naturally regenerated forest.

Increased standing volume
The standing volume of productive forest land has increased steadily since the beginning of the 1900's and is currently cirka 3347 miljoner m³sk. This is an increase of 98% since the beginning of the 1920's. Behind this development is primarily a production and growth orientated forest management.

The steadily increasing standing volume is occcured despite the fact that the area of productive forest land has remained relatively unchanged and this has meant that the forests have become more dense. Standing volume per hectare is currently 143 m³sk per hectare and 142 and 166 m³sk outside and within formally protected areas respectively.

Since 1990 the standing volume of broadleaves has increased by 66% and currently represents 19% of the total standing volume.

Significant increase in hard dead wood
Since the Swedish National Forest Inventory started collected data on all types of dead wood in the mid 1990's the total volume of dead wood has increased in all region except northern Norrland. This increase is dominated by hard dead wood. The total volume of dead wood on productive forest land is 260 million m³ or 111.1 m³ per hectare

Growth and drain
Similar to standing volume, growth has increased steadily in Sweden's forests. However during some 10 years after 2010/2011 the annual growth decreased, but in the last years there is an observed increase and the annual growth is now 117 million m³sk. The annual natural mortality has since the all time high of 17.5 million m³ now decreased to 14.8 million m³ annually on all productive forest land.

Forest damage
The Swedish National Forest Inventory registers damage to trees which could affect timber production or quaility. The highest level of forest damage is found in spruce stands in southern Sweden (8%) and in pine stands in northern Sweden (15%). The most common type of damage in evergreens is mechanical damage from wind and snow or grazing from moose on pine. 

Damage from Moose grazing
The proportion of young pine trees with fresh moose grazing damage has, since 2003, been between 6-26%. This level is clearly over the forestry sectors goal: 2% on low productivity sites and 5% on other sites. Today the national average proportion of damaged pine-trees (1-4 m of height) is 11%

Below are links to pre-filtered views. Explore the tables by clicking on the table name. You can then select new time periods, geographic areas, etc., by clicking on "Choose variable." The statistics can be downloaded in various formats and are also available via API. For each table links to standard-error tables are included.

Area conditions

Vegetation and site conditions

Standing volume and tree biomass

Annual volume increment

Forest damage

Mean annual natural loss by tree species 
Proportion of damaged trees. Maturity classes B3-D2
Damage from Elk bowsing 
Area proportion productive forest land with forest damage