Forest management practices and the occupational safety and health administration logging standard

Abstract

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has established safety and health regulations for the logging industry. These new regulations move beyond the prior OSHA pulpwood harvesting standard by including sawtimber harvesting operations. Because logging is a major tool used by forest managers to meet silvicultural goals, managers must be aware of what the OSHA standard would mean to them. Many aspects of the new standard pertain to the training of logging employees, safe equipment operation, and safe harvesting techniques, but there are sections of the OSHA standard that impact forest management practices, especially for hardwood forests, in much the same way as environmental regulations. There is the potential for forest management practices to influence the safety of logging operations by considering how the stand will be harvested when selecting silvicultural treatments for a stand. Forest managers will also be responsible for balancing conflicts between environmental issues and OSHA regulations, such as the removal of hazardous trees from a stand, the placement of skid trails, or where logging is initiated in a stand. These and other issues are discussed to give forest managers a better appreciation of their role in making logging a safer industry.

Parent Publication

• Proceedings, 10th Central Hardwood Forest Conference

Citation

Myers, John R.; Fosbroke, David Elton. 1995. Forest management practices and the occupational safety and health administration logging standard. In: Gottschalk, Kurt W.; Fosbroke, Sandra L. C., ed. Proceedings, 10th Central Hardwood Forest Conference; 1995 March 5-8; Morgantown, WV.: Gen. Tech. Rep. NE-197. Radnor, PA: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northeastern Forest Experiment Station. 454-462