There has been a strong call for monetizing industrial timberland. Various
arguments have been made in support of this, but none considered timberland
holding in the context of overall manufacturing operations of the forest p
roducts industry. After exploring some fundamental industry features, we co
nstructed a model to assess the effect of holding timberland on various ope
rating decisions: entry, exit, mothballing, and reactivation. Our numerical
example of linerboard production shows that by altering the mix of fee lan
d and open market fiber sources, holding timberland can enhance the ability
of companies to make decisions that can result in financial success in the
long term. Therefore, we argue that while opportunities exist for monetizi
ng some industrial timberland, companies should focus on how to manage thei
r forest resources as an integral part of their manufacturing businesses.