UGA Center Seeks Forest Business Partnerships in Uruguay

Leigh Miller-Villegas - Reporter Montevideo, Uruguay - 08.27.08 As reported in GlobalAtlanta.com

A delegation from the University of Georgia’s Center for Forest Business visited Uruguay Aug. 3-8 to investigate possible partnerships with Uruguayan universities to encourage further growth of the forest products industry in the South American country.

The center, housed in the Warnell School of Forest and Natural Resources, is interested in creating student, faculty and research exchanges to train Uruguayan and U.S. master’s students in the business of forestland investment and wood products manufacturing, with special focus on the industry’s development in Uruguay.

Led by Warnell School Dean Michael Clutter, the six-person Georgia delegation met with Uruguayan university, business and government representatives in the capital city of Montevideo and the northern province of Tacuarembó.

“We are quite impressed with Uruguay's dynamic forest sector and the opportunities present. With increasing wood-using plants and productive plantations, the future is bright for forestry and the forest products industry in Uruguay,” Dr. Clutter told GlobalAtlanta during the trip. “We look forward to developing joint education programs, faculty exchanges and synergistic research projects between the University of Georgia and universities in Uruguay.”

He said that he envisions Georgia faculty and graduate students doing research projects in Uruguay, and the Warnell School could make assistantships available for Uruguayan master’s and doctoral students. The exchanges would focus specifically on forest business and investment, including the financing of forestland purchases, forest products manufacturing and, possibly, new business opportunities in bioenergy

UGA Center for Forest Business Director Bob Izlar said the center has worked with other international institutions, but these exchanges would be different in that they would incorporate more direct cooperation with the forestry industry.

“We have had partnerships with forestry schools at the University of Helsinki and Royal College of Agriculture in Uppsala, Sweden. But they are nothing like we propose for Uruguay,” Mr. Izlar said.

He added that the University of Montevideo’s business school is an excellent prospect for a future partnership.

At the business school, Dr. Clutter lectured on the advantages of investing in timberlands. Tom Harris, professor of forest business and publisher of Southeast U.S. quarterly timber market prices survey “Timber Mart-South,” gave a presentation on global forest distribution and wood products manufacturing. Dale Greene, professor of forest engineering, discussed current developments in cellulosic biofuels production. Also attending were Rich Molpus and Jackson Wyss, students in the Center for Forest Business graduate program.

While in Montevideo, the group was greeted by U.S. Ambassador to Uruguay Frank Baxter, as well as the forestry director of Uruguay’s Ministry of Agriculture and the national university’s head of research and dean of agronomy. Representatives from the Uruguay Technological Laboratory’s Forest Projects Department and PricewaterhouseCoopers Uruguay gave presentations on Uruguay’s forest industry development.

The director of the Fulbright Commission of Uruguay offered to help facilitate exchange programs between UGA and Uruguayan universities. Fulbright supports U.S. faculty members and senior specialists each year to do research in Uruguay and provides scholarships for Uruguayan undergraduate and graduate students to study in U.S. universities.

The Georgia delegation also visited with the head of Uruguay operations for Albany-based company F&W Forestry Services Inc. Meetings with executives of pulp and paper companies Botnia Uruguay S.A. and Stora Enso Uruguay S.A. and forest landowners and manufacturers Weyerhaeuser and Grupo Otegui, informed the Georgia delegation about current trends in the province of Tacuarembó, the group toured Weyerhaeuser’s pine and eucalyptus plantations and manufacturing plant. There, they also met with representatives of a branch of the country’s public university and the forestry research team of a national agriculture research institute.

The forest products industry in Uruguay has been growing rapidly over the past 20 years since foreign investors began planting pine and eucalyptus stands and opening sawmills and wood products manufacturing plants. In 2006, Finland-based Oy Metsä-Botnia Ab (Botnia) made the single largest investment in Uruguay’s history when it announced a $1.1 billion eucalyptus pulp mill.

The visit to Uruguay marked the UGA Center for Forest Business’ first trip to the South American country, but it has been involved in other international partnerships and events as well.

The center hosted a Forestland Investment Conference in Munich, Germany, in February, which it plans to repeat in London, Nov. 10-11. It co-hosted a bioenergy conference in Sweden in May and is planning to host a tour to the Elmia Forest Equipment show in Sweden next June. The center is a member of the European Forest Institute, a partnership among academic, governmental and business organizations.

The UGA school’s visit to Uruguay was organized by Andrés Villegas, South America industrial development manager for Weyerhaeuser Uruguay S.A., who was previously international sales and government affairs manager at Valdosta-based Langdale Co. and legislative committee chair of the Georgia Forestry Association.

Weyerhaeuser is currently one of the largest timberland owners in Uruguay.