Master of Agricultural Technology & Ph.D.

The underlisted core courses shall be taken by all M. Agic. Tech. students in the Department.  Specialization courses shall be selected from the list of electives.  In addition, students may also take and receive credits for relevant courses at the M. Agric. Tech. level in other relevant Departments.  Candidates found to be deficient in certain areas of the undergraduate programme shall be required to audit such courses.  The courses offered by the Department at Master’s level are as follows: 

Courses for Postgraduate Programme In M.Tech. (Wood Science And Wood Products Technology)

Courses for Postgraduate Programme in M. Tech. (Forest Management, Economics, Invetory/Biometrics, Silviculture/Biology & Soils/Agroforestry)

FWT 801 – Biometrics (3 Units)
Basic parametric & non-parametric statistics; Analysis of Variance and its application in various experimental designs; correlation and Regression analysis; Analysis of covariance.

FWT 802 – Wood Composites (3 Units)
Raw materials, process and Production Parameters in the Manufacture of plywood, particleboard theoretical consideration, utilization of the panel products.

FWT 803 – Wood Properties in relation to Utilization (2 Units)
The anatomy of wood and its relationship with other wood properties – physical and mechanical properties; anistropy and its influence on methods of wood utilization; moisture/wood relationships; wood deterioration and properties desired from various end uses.

FWT 805 – Sawmilling (2 Units)
General overview of sawmilling.  Raw materials for Sawn wood, Sawmilling processes, mill layout, sawmilling products, conversion and mill handling equipment, wood waste extraction and pollution control measures, raw materials  and efficiency calculations.

FWT 806 – Wood Preservation and Seasoning (2 Units)
Agents of wood deterioration; methods of wood protection from deterioration.  Application of chemical preservatives – non-pressure and pressure methods; methods of wood seasoning and drying defects.  Chemical modification of wood to improve dimensional stability and resistance to fire and weathering.

FWT 807 – Wood Harvesting and Transportation (2 Units)
Forest Assessment; Harvesting Operation; Principal Equipment for Harvesting; Methods of Log transportation.

FWT 808 – Wood Adhesives, Finishes and Fasteners (3 Units)
Introduction to nature of adhesive; structure, properties, application and uses of adhesives in bonding wood products, testing and characterization of bonded wood products; types and application of wood finishes; mechanical wood fasteners.

FWT 809 – Economics of Wood Processing and Marketing (3 Units)
Review element of economic theory and economic institutions in relation to business practices; applied economics in relation to the following: Sawmilling, Wood-based panel production, pulp and paper mills; Marketing of wood products, cost structure, productivity and profitability, future trends in wood based industrial development in Nigeria.

FWT 810 – Wood Structures (2 Units)
Design of various structural forms of wood.  Exterior structures including bridges and marine structures; building specification methods in accordance with the Nigerian Code of Practice (NCP 2:1973);  The use of Timber in Building Construction.

FWT 811 – Advanced Silviculture (2 Units)
The concept, definition and utility of Silvics; Climatic factors affecting tree growth; Forest stand development; qualitative and quantitative variables of stand evaluation; site classification; planning large scale afforestation project; silvicultural control of wood quality.

FWT 812 – Social and Environmental Forestry (2 Units)
Role of social forestry in environmental stability; forestry for rural development; non-timber forest benefits; assessment of environmental conservation measures.

FWT 813 – Advanced Forest Mensuration (2 Units)
Growth and increment of individual trees and stands; concept of stand structure and Diameter Distribution models; Site quality assessment; Measures of stand density; Growth and Yield estimation; Modeling forest growth and yield prediction.

FWT 814 – Project Evaluation in Renewable Resources (2 Units)
Classification of renewable resource project; project evaluation techniques; Comparison of UDR and IRI; estimation of costs and revenues; special problems in project evaluation in developing countries.

FWT 815 – Tree Nutrition and Forest Soil Management (2 Units)
Nutrient Cycling in Forest ecosystems, Silvicultural implication of nutrient cycling, soil properties and site productivity; nursery soil diagnosis; impact of intensive forestry activities on long-term site productivity.

FWT 816 – Land Evaluation for Forestry (2 Units)
Nature and purpose of land evaluation, principle and basic concepts; procedure and planning of land evaluation; forest land utilization types; land use requirements; Survey and land studies; matching land use with land; environmental impact, social and economic analysis; land suitability classification.

FWT 817 – Agroforestry Systems (2 Units)
The concept of agroforestry; agroforestry practices in the tropics; classification of agroforestry systems; tree/crop interaction in agroforestry; economic concepts of agroforestry diagnosis and design of agroforestry systems.

FWT 818 – Remote Sensing and GIS  (2 Units)
Remote Sensing; biophysical consideration, the aerial camera and film filter combination, geometrical characteristics of aerial photographs; thermal scanning, SLAR; remote sensing by satellites; application to forest resources management; Application of Geographical Information Systems in environmental management.

FWT 819 - Quantitative Plant Ecology (2 Units)
Distribution, structure and dynamics of forest and savanna ecosystems; Ecological modeling and systems analysis.

FWT 820 – Advanced Sampling Techniques (2 Units)
Survey of literature and application of specialized sampling techniques in natural resources studies.  Detailed consideration of relevant probability and non-probability sampling techniques.

FWT 821 – Forest Resources Economics (2 Units)
Economic approach to forest production; organization for resource decisions and investment allocation; economics of resource conservation.

FWT 822 – Selected Topics in Advanced Forest Biometrics (3 Units)
Compounding and fractional replication in factorial experiments; incomplete block design; multivariate analysis; response surface analysis.

FWT 823 – Advanced Forest Management (2 Units)
Business methods and technical forestry principles in the operation of a forest property; case studies of management problems with particular emphasis on plantation forestry; applications of operation research in forestry.

FWT 824 – Advanced Forest  Products Marketing (2 Units)
Analysis of forest products marketing problems; planning marketing programmes; forecasting market trends; sales promotion strategies; analyses of costs and profits.

FWT 825 – Resource Inventory Analysis (2 Units)
Manual data processing; Electronic data processing; application of common software for inventory data analysis; introduction to computer programming for forestry applications.

FWT 826 – Tree Improvement and Conservation of Genetic Resources (3 Units)

Variation, selection and breeding in tree improvement; Seed Orchards; Clonal and offspring testing; in situ conservation of gene resources.

FWT 827 – Wood Chemistry (2 Units)
Chemical nature of wood and the analysis of important reactions of their constituents, include cellulose, hemicelluloses, lignin and associated materials.

FWT 828 – Research Techniques and Report Writing (2 Units)
Problem identification; Formation of research objectives; Literature review methodologies; Development of appropriate research methodologies; Data collection strategies; Data handling processing and utilization; Administration and monitoring of projects; Budget preparation; Ethical considerations in research; Report writing/manuscript writing – research proposal writing, dissemination of research results.
           

FWT 829 – Wood Machining and Tools (2 Units)
Organisation of wood processing operations.  Advanced concept on theory of cutting as it applies to wood; Basic operations and tools in the wood industries – sawing, planing, drilling, sanding, etc.

FWT 830 – Research Project (12 Units)
Independent research on topics within the area of forestry and wood technology, chosen in consultation with the student’s supervisor.  A thesis will be submitted on completion in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of M. Agric Tech. degree.

FWT 832 – Finished Products of Wood (2 Units)
Classification of finished products.  Design concepts and product development. Basic furniture production processes, industrial products of wood (pre-fabricated wooden houses, boxes, drums, sport articles, boats, musical instruments, match splits, pencils, school articles, etc.).

FWT 834 – Ergonomics and Labour Relations (2 Units)
Basic concepts of ergonomics, overview of forest work, human aspect of work, Interrelationship between man and work, man’s needs in working environment, work safety and accident prevention.