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NZ Institute of Forestry Foundation awards forestry students

New Zealand forestry student Pauline Edge has won the Mary Sutherland scholarship at the New Zealand Institute of Forestry Foundation awards. Source: The New Zealand Herald

The awards were held at the New Zealand Institute of Forestry conference dinner in Rotorua recently.

The scholarship, worth NZ$1000, went to Ms Edge who is a second year Diploma of Forest Management student at Toi-Ohomai Institute of Technology in Rotorua.

William Hollis, also a Diploma in Forest Management student at Toi-Ohomai, won NZ$800 in the student poster competition for his work on the classification of native forest using remote sensing imagery.

The New Zealand Institute of Forestry Foundation is a registered charity and was established by the New Zealand Institute of Forestry in 2011.

Its function is to raise funding which can be used to encourage and support forestry-related education, training and research through the provision of grants, scholarships and prizes.

A Future Forest Scholarship of NZ$10,000 was awarded to Fei Guo, a PhD student at the University of Canterbury looking at the use of spectroscopy of cellulose and wood to predict growth-stress levels in standing trees and logs.

The Otago/Southland Award of NZ$1500 went to Luke Holmes, a Bachelor of Forest Engineering Honours student at University of Canterbury whose research topic is the productivity of fully mechanised cable logging operations.

Michael Pay, a second year Master of Forestry Science student at University of Canterbury received the Frank Hutchinson Scholarship of NZ$1000 for a postgraduate student.

A University undergraduate scholarship of NZ$1000 was received by Morgan Scragg, a first year Bachelor of Forestry Science student at the University of Canterbury.

The Mary Sutherland scholarship of NZ$1000 went Pauline Edge, a second year Diploma of Forest Management student at Toi-Ohomai Institute of Technology in Rotorua.

Winners of the student poster competition held at the NZIF conference were:

– William Hollis, a Diploma in Forest Management student at Toi-Ohomai Institute of Technology, Rotorua, for a poster on the classification of native forest using remote sensing imagery (first prize of NZ$800)

– Okey Francis Obi, a PhD student at University of Canterbury, for a poster on the efficiency of logging crews (second prize of NZ$500)

– Michael Pay, a Master of Forestry Science student at University of Canterbury for a poster on outcomes from management of a marginal hill country forest property (third prize of NZ$200).