Metsanduslik Uurimisinstituut

General information

The Forest Research Institute is a research and development institution of the Estonian Agricultural University and it has operated in its present form since 1998.

The predecessor of the Institute was the Forest Research Institute established in 1936 under the University of Tartu. After World War II, the forest research continued at the Forestry Department of the Institute of Zoology and Botany of the Academy of Sciences of the Estonian SSR (1947-1963), then at the Forestry Research Laboratory (1963-1969) and at the Estonian Institute of Forestry and Nature Conservation (1969-1996) subordinated to the Ministry of Forestry and Nature Conservation (Ministry of the Environment). In 1996, the Estonian Institute of Forestry and Nature Conservation was closed, the main research staff joined to the Faculty of Forestry of the Estonian Agricultural University where a separate unit as the Research Center for Forest Ecosystems was established. In 1997 it was reorganized to the Forest Research Institute, the Department of Ecophysiology from the Institute of Ecology was amalgamated to the Forest Research Institute in 1998.

The Forest Research Institute has two departments - Department of Forest Biology in Tartu and Department of Ecophysiology in Tallinn. There are 23 persons working at the Institute, 12 researchers have a doctor's degree (Ph.D.) and 3 researhers have a master's degree (M.Sc.).

The tasks of the Institute include research, consultations and development in all fields of forest science and forestry, but also in other areas closely related to forest and forestry, such as nature conservation and environmental protection, wildlife management, forest entomology and pathology, etc. At the Department of Forest Biology, miscellaneous study involving forest ecosystems is carried out in order to provide a scientific basis for economically and ecologically sustainable forest management. The main objectives of research are the generalisation of historical-theoretical experience in Estonian forestry and the elaboration of biological and silvicultural basis for growing, protection and utilisation of diverse and productive forests. Fundamental ecological studies are carried out at the Department of Ecophysiology. Main focus is on the physiological and biochemical aspects of stress tolerance of coniferous trees and on the fundamentals of resistance of trees to biotic and abiotic stress factors.

Forest Research Institute regularly publishes the annual scientific journal "Metsanduslikud Uurimused" (Forestry Studies, vol. 39 in 2003) and the collection of papers "Dendroloogilised Uurimused" (Dendrological Researches in Estonia) as well as the series "Eesti dendrofloora uuringud" (Researches of woody plants of Estonia). "Proceedings of the Estonian Academic Forest Society" (vol 20 in 2003) are published in co-operation with the Estonian Society of Foresters. The Forest Research Institute also participates in publishing an international scientific journal "Baltic Forestry", the journal of forest science in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia (vol. 9 in 2003).