Abstract
Short rotation poplar forests are a viable alternative in producing high quality wood for industrial applications. Their success depends on timely and high-quality implementation of a series of operations. Weed control operations are implemented to favor the trees in their competition for soil resources, and cultivation is an option typically used in many European countries. For the moment, a complete mechanization of such operations is virtually impossible, and they still require an intensive use of manual labor. Since information on work difficulty and risks in manual cultivation operations is limited, this study aimed to characterize this job. Evaluation was made in terms of work efficiency, cardiovascular workload, work intensity and postural risks by implementing a time and motion study combined with heart rate measurements, accelerometry and whole-body postural analysis. Work efficiency was particularly low even if the share of effective work time was high (70% of the observation time). Job was characterized as moderate to high intensity, which resulted into a moderate to high cardiovascular strain. While the postural analysis indicated rather small risks, the main problem was found for the back postures assumed during the work. Improvements should aim to extend mechanization, train the workers and appropriately design rest breaks.
Highlights
Short rotation cultivated forests are considered to be a valuable alternative for wood provisioning, enabling the possibility to reduce the anthropogenic disturbance on natural forests and to conserve them
Other delays, including those caused by the study itself were only minor in the time consumption structure, accounting for less than 1%
The main conclusion of this study is that the manual cultivation operations in poplar forests are rather difficult and hazardous, requiring reengineering tasks from ergonomic and public health points of view
Summary
Short rotation cultivated forests are considered to be a valuable alternative for wood provisioning, enabling the possibility to reduce the anthropogenic disturbance on natural forests and to conserve them. Among the existing fast-growing species, poplars are intensively used in many countries for such outcomes [1] Their cultivation supposes a sequence of operations including fertilization, irrigation and weed control [2], with the last one aiming to balance the competition for soil resources and being carried out, in many regions, by herbicide application, cultivation or a combination of the two [1]. Some of these practices (i.e., in Romania) are used even in regular poplar forests that could be assimilated to short rotation cultures due to the propagation techniques and geometrical plantation schemes that are used, types of implemented operations and rotation length. The typical way of carrying on the weed control is by cultivation
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