Forest accounts

Statistics Estonia

Economic and Environmental Statistics Department

Kaia Oras

Leading Expert

Tatari 51, 10134 Tallinn, Estonia

kaia.oras [at] stat.ee

3725042694

02/10/2025

02/10/2025

Opening area of wooded land at the beginning of the reference year, afforestation and other increases of wooded land, deforestation and other decreases of wooded land, closing area of wooded land at the end of the reference year, opening stock of timber on wooded land at the beginning of the reference year, net increment of timber on wooded land, removals of timber on wooded land, closing stock of timber on wooded land at the end of the reference year.

Published by the end of the year: total output (at basic prices), live forest tree plants and tree seeds, forest trees, wood in the rough, logs, fuel wood, pulpwood, non-wood products, services characteristic of the forestry and logging activity, other products, total intermediate consumption, forest trees, live forest tree plants and forest tree seeds used to produce timber, energy and lubricants, the sum of services characteristic of the forestry and logging activity, other goods and services used as inputs, gross value added, consumption of fixed capital, other taxes on production, other subsidies on production, compensation of employees, net operating surplus and mixed income, gross fixed capital formation (excluding deductible VAT), changes in inventories, changes in work-in-progress on cultivated biological assets, other changes in inventories, capital transfers, total labour input, in 1,000 harmonized AWU

Classification of Economic Activities in Estonia (EMTAK 2008) based on NACE Rev. 2;

Classification of Products and Services;

Combined Nomenclature (CN);

ESA 2010 Classification of Transactions and Other Flows

Economic variables are covered for the forestry and logging activity (NACE A.02).

Forest accounts – asset accounts for forest resources, comprising wooded land and timber on wooded land, and economic activity accounts for forestry and logging

Forest – land spanning more than 0.5 hectares with trees higher than five metres and a canopy cover of more than 10% or trees able to reach those thresholds in situ. It does not include land that is predominantly under agricultural land use or trees in urban settings, such as city parks, alleys and gardens.

Other wooded land – land not classified as forest, spanning more than 0.5 hectares; with trees higher than five metres and a canopy cover of 5 to 10% or trees able to reach those thresholds in situ; or with a combined cover of shrubs, bushes and trees greater than 10%. It does not include land that is predominantly under agricultural land use or trees in urban settings, such as city parks, alleys and gardens.

Net annual increment of timber – the average annual volume growth of live trees less the average annual mortality

Removals – the volume of all trees, living or dead, that are felled and removed from the forest, other wooded land or other felling sites. It includes unsold roundwood stored at the forest roadside. It also includes natural losses that are recovered, removals during the year of wood felled in an earlier period, removals of non-stem wood (such as stumps and branches), and removal of trees killed or damaged by natural causes (known as natural losses), e.g. fire, wind, insects and diseases. It does not include non-woody biomass or any wood that is left in the forest and not removed during the year, e.g. stumps, branches, tree tops and felling residues (harvesting waste).

Irretrievable losses – felling residues and all fellings from windthrow that cannot be removed from the forest, and timber lost through forest fires

Institutional unit;

economic territory

All institutional units;

whole economic territory of Estonia

FRAME

Not applicable

Estonia as a whole

2022–…

Not applicable

Area of wooded land – thousand hectares;

volume of timber on wooded land – thousand m³;

value of timber on wooded land – thousand euros;

economic indicators for forestry and logging – million euros;

total labour input in the forestry and logging industry – 1,000 harmonized AWU

Year

DIRECTLY APPLICABLE LEGAL ACTS

Regulation (EU) 2024/3024 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 November 2024 amending Regulation (EU) No 691/2011 as regards introducing new environmental economic account modules (Text with EEA relevance)

Regulation (EU) No 691/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 July 2011 on European environmental economic accounts

OTHER LEGAL ACTS

Not available

OTHER AGREEMENTS

Not available

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in §§ 32, 34, 35, and 38 of the Official Statistics Act.

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is based on the requirements laid down in §§ 34 and 35 of the Official Statistics Act.

The principles for treatment of confidential data can be found here.

Notifications about the dissemination of statistics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on 1 October, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month).

Calendar

All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. If there is also a news release, it is published simultaneously with data in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8.00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar.

Annual

Not published

Not published

The data are published in the statistical database under the subject area Environment / Environmental accounts / Forest accounts in the following tables:

KK53: Area of wooded land by type and component of balance; in September

KK54: Timber volume and value on wooded land by type of land and component of balance; in December

KK55: Economic indicators for forestry and logging; in December

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in §§ 33, 34, 35, 36, and 38 of the Official Statistics Act. Access to microdata and anonymisation of microdata are regulated by Statistics Estonia’s procedure for dissemination of confidential data for scientific purposes.

Not used

European forest accounts handbook, 2024 edition

In accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1165/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council, a report on the methodology used and the quality achieved is prepared.

To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the EFQM Excellence Model and the requirements in § 7 “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act.

Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is a general evaluation using information gathered in each phase or subprocess. This information may take various forms, such as feedback from users, process-related metadata, production metrics, and recommendations/advice from staff. Based on this information, an evaluation report is prepared, highlighting all quality issues related to the version of the statistical activity and providing input for improvement actions.

Quality is managed by the quality manager.

Ministry of Climate;

Ministry of Regional Affairs and Agriculture;

Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications;

Estonian Environment Agency

Since 1996, Statistics Estonia has conducted reputation and user satisfaction surveys. All results are available on Statistics Estonia's website in the section User surveys.

Forest accounts are in compliance with the requirements of Regulation (EU) No 691/2011 and the rules of the national accounts.

Accuracy is ensured by applying the methodology developed by Eurostat.

Not applicable since this is not a sample survey.

Statistics Estonia aims to reduce the amount of non-sampling errors through continuous improvement of the methodology and the survey process.

The data are published within 21 months of the end of the reference year (T + 21 months).

Data published in 2025 refer to 2022 and 2023.

Data are published according to the release calendar.

Geographical comparability of forest accounts among the European Union Member States is ensured through the application of common definitions of European Forest Accounts. However, country-specific methodological particularities must be taken into account.

Figures are generally comparable. However, timber stocks from different years cannot be considered directly comparable in monetary terms, as their valuation applies different discount rates. The assessment of assets over the years is influenced by changing market prices, as well as other factors. Therefore, a timber stock of the same volume may be reflected with a different monetary value in one year’s report compared with another. In the methodology of asset accounting, a revision is possible in accordance with Eurostat guidelines.

Forest accounts are comparable to and can be linked with the national accounts system. Differences arising from the methodology can be explained.

The outputs of the statistical activity are coherent.

Since this statistical activity is based on administrative data and on data from other statistical activities, it does not involve the provision of data and therefore does not impose any burden. Costs are not calculated by statistical activities.

The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described on Statistics Estonia's website in the section Principles of dissemination of official statistics.

The published data may be revised if the methodology is modified, errors are discovered, new or better data become available.

Regular revisions are carried out annually in accordance with the national accounts methodology.

SURVEY DATA

Not used

ADMINISTRATIVE DATA

Annual reports are received from the commercial register of the Centre of Registers and Information Systems.

Data on wooded land, opening and closing stock of timber, net increment, mortality, irretrievable losses, statistical reclassification, balancing item, removals and harvest physical data are received from the Estonian Environment Agency. Road-side prices of timber by assortments and species are received from the State Forest Management Centre.

Data on payments of capital transfers are received from the Estonian Environmental Investment Centre.

DATA FROM OTHER STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES

For compilation of accounts, data from statistical activities 20300 “Financial statistics of enterprises (annual)”, 21408 “Supply and use tables”, 21401 “National accounts (annual)”, 40013 “Labour Force Survey”, 20901 “Business register for statistical purposes” are used.

Annual

Administrative data are received via X-Tee, an FTP-server, and email.

Arithmetic and qualitative controls are used in the validation process, including comparison with other data.

Microdata from various data sources are aggregated based on the methodology used.

Handbook: European forest accounts handbook, 2024 edition

Not applied