Northeast Forestry College, the predecessor of Northeast Forestry University, was founded in 1952, based on the Forestry Department of Agricultural College of Zhejiang University and the Forestry Department of Northeast Agricultural College. 1985 was renamed Northeast Forestry University.

It is a multi-disciplinary national key university directly under the Ministry of Education of People's Republic of China (PRC), featuring forestry engineering and integrating agriculture, science, engineering, economics, management, literature, law, medicine and arts. It is also the national key construction institution of "2 1 1 Project" and "985 Engineering Advantage Discipline Innovation Platform". Selected in "20 1 1 plan", "excellent engineer education and training plan", "11plan" and "excellent agricultural and forestry talents education and training plan", the State Forestry Administration and the People's Government of Heilongjiang Province jointly established a university with a graduate school.