Uses of Forestry Commission statistics
The statistics that we produce are used by the public sector, businesses, trade associations, academics, members of the public and others for a variety of purposes, including:
- providing information on the economy/society/environment;
- informing policy and programme development;
- for policy/programme evaluation and monitoring;
- promoting the benefits of forestry;
- informing marketing campaigns;
- assessing the performance of government/ public bodies;
- facilitating academic research;
- informing investment decisions; and
- allocating resources.
For more information on users' views of our statistics, see the results from our 2011 User Engagement Survey.
Our implementation plan indicates the action we are planning to take for each recommendation.
Your views
In order to improve the statistics that we produce and to ensure that they remain relevant, we are interested in hearing from people who use our statistics.
We use a variety of methods to obtain the views of our users, including formal groups (e.g. the Expert Group on Timber and Trade Statistics), consultation with key users and more informal routes (e.g. comments received from users).
Our work plans indicate what we are planning to do in the current year and report on progress at the end of each year. If you wish to provide comments on our work plans or on any other aspect of our statistics (including the uses made of our statistics), please contact us at any time:
By e-mail - statistics@forestry.gsi.gov.uk
By telephone - 0131 314 6171
Alternatively, if you would like to be consulted when we are reviewing our statistics, please register your interest by e-mailing us at statistics@forestry.gsi.gov.uk, noting which of the following topics you are interested in:
- Woodland Area and Planting
- UK Grown Timber
- Trade
- UK Forests & Climate Change
- Environment
- Recreation
- Employment & Businesses
- Finance & Prices
- International Forestry
Major consultation exercises have taken place for the UK Indicators of Sustainable Forestry in 2001-2002 and for the National Statistics quality review of forestry statistics in 2002. See our methodology and outputs reviews page for further details.
Customer Service: Service Standards
If you get in touch with us, you can expect us to be polite, approachable and helpful, and to readily identify ourselves. We will make every reasonable effort to ensure that you are provided with information that is timely, relevant and accurate, and we will endeavour to meet the following targets:
- We will endeavour to respond to customer correspondence, whether in paper or electronic form, within 5 working days commencing from the date when we receive your correspondence.
- Our response will either be an answer to the issue you have raised, or a notification that the correspondence is being dealt with, but noting that the reply may take longer than the initial 5 day period.
- Our holding reply will either contain a date by which we intend to provide a full response, or a date by which we will contact you with a progress update.
- We will return customers' calls within 1 working day.
Sometimes, our service delivery standards will be affected by circumstances beyond our control and occasionally we make mistakes. When this happens we will apologise and do everything we can to put things right. If you have a concern about the quality of our service, or the treatment you have received from us, and you cannot resolve the problem with the person you have been dealing with, please contact:
Sheila Ward
Economics and Statistics
Forestry Commission
231 Corstorphine Road
Edinburgh EH12 7AT
E-mail: statistics@forestry.gsi.gov.uk
Tel: 0131 314 6475
Fax: 0131 316 4344