A particular case of implementing the analytic hierarchy process in the case of nonwood forest products from Teleorman County, Romania

Abstract

The harvesting importance and the introduction in economic circuit of non-wood forest products, especially forest fruits, mushrooms, game reside both under economic aspect, representing a proportion over 10% from the business number realized by many County Forest Administrations and mostly from the social point of view, through the capital amount in rural zones where the population incomes come almost exclusive from agricultural activities. The aim of this paper was to highlight the most important non-wood forest products from Teleorman County and to analyze the social and economic impact of those from Teleorman county, Romania. The NWFPs were grouped in four categories, namely Mushrooms (Boletus edulis and Lactarius piperatus), Tree products (Linden flowers, oak seeds), Understory plants (Rubus idaeus, Mentha piperita) and Animal origin (Lepus europaeus, Squalius cephalus). Within the research method it was used the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) which use an interface of multi-criteria system. Based on the processing data in the Expert Choice Desktop software, it was found that the most important non-wood forest products were forest fruits (raspberries), mushrooms (Penny bun) and those of animal origin (European hare). This kind of analysis it can be addressed to the managers who wants to perform the activities inside of the company such as making some statistics about the relative consumption of some products.