SELECTED ASPECTS OF THE TRANSITION TO THE ON-LINE STUDY PROCESS DURING THE PANDEMIC, CASE: BIOTECHNICAL FACULTY

Due to measures and restrictions taken by many governments around the world for preventing the spread of the Covid-19 virus and thus the pandemic, many higher education institutions have been closed for a long time. In order not to stop the study process completely, university and faculty management had to make sure that most of the study activities were carried out regardless of the new situation. Digitalization of these activities or moving most of them to cloud platforms that allow distance learning has become one of their priorities. Despite all the already established digital solutions in the implementation of the study process, such as standard e-classrooms, many obstacles and challenges have arisen when migrating practically all study activities to the online environment. The technological challenges can be relatively easily solved, while organizational and legal issues are more complex. The research, which was carried out after the first wave of "forced" digitalization of study at the Biotechnical Faculty in the first half of 2020, shows very interesting results, among which is the rapid adaptation of all stakeholders in the study process to the new situation. Moreover, many opportunities have emerged that will undoubtedly affect the implementation of the pedagogical process in the future.

Challenges of the transition to the on-line educational process during the pandemic

Education has changed enormously during the Covid-19 virus pandemic. It has changed at all levels of education, including the university level. In reorganizing their educational process, educational institutions had to take into account a number of actions and recommendations from the government and the epidemiological profession, as well as their available technological and human resources. During the first wave of the pandemic, when the new situation was solved in an ad hoc manner, improvisation was a normal response, while after this period a more organized response was expected. Educational institutions invested heavily in a technology platform for online teaching, benefiting from numerous government grants, and also used all their existing equipment. Great emphasis was also placed on staff training, particularly on strengthening their digital literacy skills, which are essential for the implementation of online education. However, there were many other challenges, mainly in the sociological and psychological fields, as exclusion could not be solved for all, online work and study segregate us and do not provide real human contact, which learners in particular desperately need, etc. The research was related to higher education in the wood sector in Slovenia. © 14th International Scientific Conference WoodEMA 2021 - The Response of the Forest-Based Sector to Changes in the Global Economy, Proceedings. All rights reserved.

Production management model in SME's in some South-Central EU countries during pandemic

Small and medium enterprises play a key role in the economy of the European Union as the main generators of employment and economic development. According to the official statistics the EU, more than 98 % of all enterprises are small and medium. Similar situation is among wood processing and furniture manufacturing enterprises in Croatia and Slovenia, two south-central EU countries. In order to be successful, the enterprises have to harmonize various parameters through strategic planning, preparation, organization and decision making. Through the period of global pandemic of Covid-19, small and medium enterprises suffered the most. To be able to survive, they had to reconsider their view on the parameters of production management. This research was trying to establish the way of thinking among managers in SME’s regarding production management parameters and to create the model for production management in small and medium wood processing and furniture manufacturing enterprises. © 14th International Scientific Conference WoodEMA 2021 - The Response of the Forest-Based Sector to Changes in the Global Economy, Proceedings. All rights reserved.

Sustainable Production Management Model for Small and Medium Enterprises in Some South-Central EU Countries

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are main generators of employment and economic development in European Union. In Croatia and Slovenia, SMEs in wood processing (C16) and furniture manufacturing (C31) also play an important role in social cohesion and development of rural areas. The aim of this research was to investigate the current situation in SMEs in wood processing and furniture manufacturing regarding driving parameters of business and production management system in the time of a disturbed market situation caused by the COVID-19 global pandemic. Two different questionnaires in an e-mail survey were used to collect data for this research from companies and from experts in the field of management, production and marketing. Various statistical tests were used using seven driving parameters on data collected from 212 SMEs. Also, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) was used on the data collected from 20 experts. Results showed that companies in the time of pandemic crisis and during the time of major disturbances in supply chain pay the most attention to their production program and quality of their products, and then to marketing activities and situation on the market. According to the results presented in this research, the management model can help SMEs managers, micro and small enterprises in particular, to improve their decision-making process, make the necessary innovations easier and faster, and maintain the sustainable business and production management system of their companies.

A comprehensive evaluation model for wood companies websites based on the ahp/r-topsis method

Recently, partly as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, companies are increasingly shift-ing their activities to the Internet environment, thus accelerating the growth of online shopping. The aim of this study was to develop a comprehensive model for the evaluation of websites of wood companies, as a review of the literature shows that such a model does not yet exist. In developing the model, we used an innovative approach and combined the analytic hierarchy process with R-TOPSIS (technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution), which is a novelty in this field. For the final website assessment, the Website Quality Index (WQI) was developed. The main difference to other indexes is that our model has a comprehensive content background (36 criteria and sub-criteria) and a strong mathematical basis, so that it can be used to independently evaluate a single website or to evaluate a larger group of websites from the same industry. We have tested the model on 60 websites of Slovenian wood industry companies with at least ten employees. The results show the low to moderate average quality of the websites, with an average WQI of all evaluated websites of 0.450, indicating only an acceptable website. It has proven to be easy to use, and the results show the reliability of the website rating. Additionally, the designed model is an im-portant tool for industry website developers and the basis for future studies in this field. However, it can also be applied to other areas related to wood and wood products, where the performance of objects should be evaluated with respect to multiple criteria. © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.