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Posted (edited)

This from our socials might interest you.

If you're a UK Arborist, you'll know that Professional Tree Inspection (PTI) is often the most requested credential for surveying and inspecting trees.
 

A common concern raised by Arborists at VALID tree risk training is PTI doesn't actually teach you how to assess risk!
 

So how can you spend all that time and effort training to inspect a tree - then go inspect one for a client - without producing a risk rating?
 

Even worse, if you don't understand what the risk is, how can you recommend risk-reduction tree work with very specific timeframes? That's a core requirement of PTI.

Is PTI really fit for purpose?

 

Let's look at this key learning objective from the PTI course blurb, which cuts to the heart of the issue.

"You'll learn how to clearly and competently inspect potentially hazardous trees."
 

PTI Cover.pdf

 

Here's the problem: we've moved beyond hazard-based thinking. We now focus on 𝘳𝘪𝘴𝘬-based thinking.
 

One reason is the definition of a hazard is something that has the potential to cause death, injury, or property damage.
 

And by that definition, every tree has this potential.
 

So, almost every tree is a hazard.
 

That's not helpful when you're managing or assessing the risk from tree failure.
 

The PTI's poor grasp of risk becomes even clearer when you examine the phrase "potentially hazardous trees".
 

If a hazard is something with the potential to cause harm, then a "potentially hazardous tree" is a tree that potentially has the potential to cause harm.
 

That's a whole lot of weasel-phrase bafflegab.
 

With PTI, "hazardous" is a lazy shortcut to imply the risk is too high - without putting in the work to actually assess the risk.

 

Edited by Acer ventura
typo

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Posted

There's nothing new in this, it's PTI, not Professional Tree Risk Assessment. NTSG zooms out and sets the context of risk management. Tree inspectors are not decision makers or risk managers, they make recommendations. Daily, completely unqualified but occasionally experienced tree surgeons make quasi-risk recommendations to customers without any systematic basis, and within days whole trees are removed. If any change is needed to PTI it is to make it clear to candidates that it is not tree risk assessment. Where the industry takes it from there is a different matter. Like when you get recommendations and a price from a builder for your extension, the public seem happy with it this way. The furure about the proposed tree risk BS was some sort of evidence of that.

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