Journal Article
Skidding operation constitute the entire
process of moving felled trees from the
stump site to the roadside landing. This
operation normally bears substantial amount
of the mill delivery costs. Thus, detailed
information on productivity and cost is
important for planning of cost-effective
skidding operation. This study was
conducted at Sao hill Forest plantation to
quantify productivity and costs of tree length
skidding operations. Continuous time study
technique using snap-back method was used
for time recording. Costs data were obtained
from Mufindi Paper Mill logging
department.
Productivity
and
costs
modeling, were performed using Microsoft
excel. The analysis, showed that; the average
productivity of the grapple skidder using tree
length (TL) ranges between 398.423 m 3 /hr at
a distance of 10 m and 49.862 m 3 /hr at a
distance of 80 m. On the costs analysis, the
unit skidding costs tends to increase with an
increase of skidding distance (m) from
512.197 TZS/m 3 at a distance of 10 m to
4,092.675 TZS/m 3 at a distance of 80 m.
Based on these findings it is recommended
that variables distance and volume are the
core factors to consider during planning to
enhance efficient and costs effective
skidding operation.