Estimating Annual Investment Returns from Industrial Planted Forests of Radiata Pine in New Zealand

The purpose of this paper is develop an industry-level (average) estimate of annual investment returns from industrial planted forests in New Zealand, from publicly-available financial statement data. The research used data from seven New Zealand commercial forest-growing companies, for the period 2008 to 2018. These companies managed around 600,000 ha of planted forest (or about half of the industrial forest estate in New Zealand), and had a total asset value of approximately NZ 11 billion in 2018. The data were used to calculate an average industry-level estimate of annual investment returns, from 2009 to 2018. The calculated value is directly equivalent to the one-period internal rate of return and is separable into two components – cash return on assets and the real change in asset value. Since 2009, commercial forestry investment returns (unleveraged, pre-tax) have increased. The average investment return for 2009 to 2013 was 5.4%, while for 2014 to 2018 the average investment return was 14.7%. These returns are superior to returns from pastoral farming.