At this time, forests were mismanaged and the land division made rationalization impossible. These were some of the main arguments for those advocating more concentrated or state ownership. There were also pressures from unions to nationalize forests to guarantee jobs.
Individual forest owners were critical of the statements being made. Own measures were necessary to respond to the criticism. The forestry unions' criticism was that a stabilization of the sawmill industry would proceed much faster if the state managed that part. They also recommended that forest owners establish themselves as major players in the refinement industry. In the "Sköldska motion" submitted to the Riksdag in 1956 by, among others, Per-Edvin Sköld, radical changes in the forestry law were proposed. Private forestry should not cooperate with the semi-state forestry boards – there should be watertight barriers between private forest owners and the state.
Forestry Areas Formed
With the debate on the efficiency of private forestry, the government commissioned a forestry investigation in 1955, which was completed in 1958. The investigation found no difference in forest management between different ownership categories. The investigation recommended that forestry boards support the work of forestry associations for cooperation between individual forest owners. This period's debate led to the formation of forest management areas. In 1956, the first forestry area was started in southern Sweden, Linneryd's forestry area, by the South-Eastern Federation. The purpose was to achieve greater cooperation between ownership categories. Forestry and rationalization of logging were the main goals for forestry areas. Trained personnel were employed to impart knowledge, and forest owners signed forest management agreements where they committed to using the services of the personnel. By the end of 1959, five forestry areas had been formed within the South-Eastern Federation.
New land acquisition law
The same debate about a few large forest owners resurfaced ten years later, in the 1960s, but the argument then was that small individual owners hindered mechanization of forestry and forest regeneration. In early 1964, a memo from the Ministry of Agriculture proposed a new land acquisition law. The proposal called for radical changes regarding the circle of those with precedence in acquiring agricultural and forestry units. The previous law, which barred commercial activities for processing and distribution of agricultural or forestry products from acquiring property, would be repealed. The market would be set free. The individual owner would then find it harder to compete with industry in expanding their properties.
A large protest meeting was arranged by Södra in Apladalen in Värnamo. The new and larger association formed in 1964 had a strong voice in protecting the interests of individual forest owners. A newspaper headline was "Six thousand angry farmers attack the agriculture minister." However, the new land acquisition law passed. To secure property acquisition for its members, the Swedish Forest Owners’ Federation (SSR), the National Union for the Rural Populace (RLF), and the Swedish Agricultural Federation (SL) joined forces and established five regional guarantee institutes in 1966. Their primary task was to facilitate credit granting for property purchases and rationalization.