Page 12 - Georgia Forestry - Issue 4 - Fall 2021

“Some stands need more love
than others, but we want to make sure that all of the trees that we’re planting or managing are on a good growth trajectory.” — Scott Griffin
“It’s not a cookie-cutter program,” Griffin says. “Some stands need more love than others, but we want to make sure that all of the trees that we’re plant- ing or managing are on a good growth trajectory.”
Chad Nimmer, owner of Pierce Timber/Suwannee Forest Products, has worked with the company for almost two decades. He says Superior Pine proactively manages its land with people out in the field observing what their loggers do.
“They are one of the more aggres- sive companies in how they grow their timber and the intensive management with their harvest rotations,” he says.
Over the years, Superior Pine also has diversified, moving into blueberry farming to generate revenue in the spring, when wood prices drop.
“The blueberries help to provide that extra cash flow for the company, during a time when timber prices some- times decrease” Griffin says. “We have high-quality fruit that we grow, and we try to sell to high-quality brokerages, companies and grocery stores.”
Under Griffin, the company continues to look for new ways to generate revenue. For example, he sees opportunities to sell carbon credits generated from Supe- rior Pine’s land management activities.
“That whole [carbon] program is growing in the south,” Griffin says. “His- torically, it had been a California process, but it’s growing to a national level now. We’ve actually explored some options, and so we see that as an opportunity for the company to make some extra income into the future with minimal impact to our sustainable operations.”
10 | GEORGIA FORESTRY
GIVING
BACK
For Superior Pine,
sustainability
means more than
just responsibly
managing its land. Sustainability means giving back to the Fargo area.
T he company manages the Oettmeier Foundation, a grant program primarily focused on education and assisting children and the local community, for example by helping fund a STEM lab.
But that is not all the Oettmeier Foundation does. It has supported
the local volunteer fire departments and also contributed to creating a medical facility in the Fargo area that is open once a week. Without the clinic, residents would have to drive 40 miles for medical care, according to Scott Griffin, president and CEO of Superior Pine Products Company.
“The population here is very small, and it is difficult to support many businesses or medical facilities,” Griffin says.
From his perch as a company board member, Brooks Mendell, Ph.D., sees that Superior Pine’s shareholders are committed to the town of Fargo. “The family and the owners who don’t live there spend a lot of time talking about that community and thinking about how they can be supportive of the people who live there,” he says.
Those community contributions don’t tell the entire story about how Superior Pine supports the local area. It employs 20 people full-time, but that can ebb and flow throughout the year. If it’s time to pick blueberries or plant trees, it can employ up to 300 people. “A lot of people make a pretty decent living from this property,” Griffin says.
As Superior Pine thinks about sustainability into the future, it continues to develop its environmental, social and governance [ESG] program to “align with the rest of the world,” as Griffin puts it.
“Even though we’re small, we try to do a good job managing the property in a sustainable way that’s conducive to the environment, combined with thesocialaspectofhelpingthecommunity,”Griffinsays.