Main goal
The graduate Program in Forest science (PPGCF) at UFV has as its general objective the training of excellent human resources, which will act as transforming agents and multipliers of knowledge in the forest sector, enabling them to carry out teaching, research and to have an entrepreneurial vision, as well as act in the formation of elements that contribute to strengthening the forest sector chain. The objectives of the PPGCF are in line with the Strategic Plan of the Federal University of Viçosa (UFV) to become an institution of excellence, becoming a reference in all fields of knowledge, constantly requiring the improvement and strengthening of research and graduate policies.
Specific objectives
Specific objectives include:
– Support and strengthen scientific initiation programs to train future researchers.
– Modernize and rationalize administrative academic resources for more transparent and efficient management.
– Strongly support the training of PPGCF professors at post-doctoral level. The training and continuous improvement of professors are institutional goals that aim to give PPGCF all the credentials to be a reference in the forest sector in Brazil and align itself with the most advanced countries in the world.
– Maintain a highly qualified teaching staff, laboratories equipped with state-of-the-art modern instruments.
– Maintain strategic partnerships with other departments and institutions in Brazil and abroad, which guarantee the carrying out of research that can help in the country’s development.
– Stimulate institutional partnerships in developing countries, in international cooperation programs, enabling the training and qualification of future professionals who will act as multiplying and transforming agents in their countries. In this sense, UFV and PPGCF exceed themselves in their mission of not only training professionals, but also training new professionals who will be able to work in the academic and research areas of their countries.
– Develop technologically based scientific research of strategic interest to Brazilian forestry companies.
– Support the Forestry Research Society, which is an important institution that works in synergy with the PPGCF, since the Government of the State of Minas Gerais and companies from different sectors of the forestry segment express their demands and collaborate technically and financially for enabling research. Such partnerships help to consolidate the graduate program, strengthening it and feeding it back with projects, which result in dissertations and theses, in tune with the emerging and current issues of the situations raised.
– Encourage the participation of professors and researchers from other teaching and research institutions in the PPGCF dissertation/thesis defense committees.
– Continuously encourage the increase in publications by professors and students in high-impact international scientific journals.
– Increase the internationalization of its activities, seeking partnerships, agreements, exchanges of students and professors and carrying out publications, with the participation of professors and researchers from foreign institutions.
Such situations place UFV and the graduate Program as points of reference on the national and international scene, giving them the necessary visibility to be a respected and opinion-forming institution within the academic and scientific community, as well as the various sectors in the productive segment
The continuous and bold intellectual improvement of its professors also guarantees benefits for the Undergraduate Course in Forest engineering at UFV. Of the 24 permanent professors at PPGCF, in 2020, 14 are CNPq researchers (research productivity fellows). The lines of research are structured to make Master's and Doctorate Courses compatible, as well as to meet the growing demand for scientific and technological knowledge.
The teaching staff is entirely made up of professors with a doctorate degree. Thus, even on the guidance committees and dissertation/thesis defense boards, all professors have at least a doctorate. Several professors already have post-doctoral degrees from foreign universities, of various nationalities.
Graduate Profile
Graduates of the graduate Program in Forest science (PPGCF) have worked in the most diverse activities, with emphasis on academic areas and the industrial sector, working as professors at higher education institutions in the country and also as CEOs, directors and managers of several Brazilian and foreign forestry companies. Available data show the existence of 74 (sixty-four ) Forest engineering schools in the country, including public and private institutions. More recently, technical schools (Federal Institutes of Education) emerged that have numerous professors remaining from the graduate Program in Forest science at UFV. They were trained and qualified by the Program and now act as multiplier agents in more than a hundred schools across the country. To demonstrate such magnitudes, of the 175 graduates at doctoral level, between 2006 and 2020, 72.3 % are involved in teaching, research and extension activities at universities and public and private institutions in Brazil.
Several students graduating from PPGCF are in federal and state institutions, such as EMBRAPA, IEF, SEMAD and several research and development institutes in the country.
Several students graduating from PPGCF have dedicated themselves to the production sector. Many work in the private sector, whether in industry, in management companies, consultancy and or have set up their own companies in the traditional way or startups.
In the productive sector, the PPGCF's performance is of outstanding importance due to the sector's significant participation in the national economy, which today is in line with the most advanced countries in the world, standing out for its competitiveness in quality and productivity in all segments of the productive sector. The technologies generated by companies resulted in significant gains, making Brazil a leader in the sector, thanks, among other factors, to the products of research carried out through our Postgraduate Program.
