Finland’s
forest sector achieves ecological sustainability. By 2020 Finland has
reached the ten per cent target level of strictly protected forests,
giving over a "tithe to nature". A further ten per cent are
managed as Nature Value Forests, i.e. forests permitting commercial
logging but with extensive management for biodiversity. Management in
more conventional commercial forest has also undergone changes away
from cultivation of evenaged monocultures towards imitation of more
natural forest ecosystems.
Southern
Finland has twenty large forested national parks. These offer a
high level of biological, cultural and economic service to society.
Forest biodiversity is stable or rising. Forest sector employment
has improved throughout; nature tourism is booming and wood is being
refined to a high level by a well-developed carpentry industry and
by artists working in wood. The proximity of national parks to many
cities has brought back natural history into the lives of most citizens.
Finland’s
international conservation reputation is high. It does not permit
paper imports from countries damaging their biologically valuable
forests nor gives development aid or investment support to foreign
projects that risk causing such damage. Within Finland, industrial
co-operation with ecologists for achieving sustainability has increased
public interest in forestry and pride in the Finnish paper industry.
Forest companies have voluntarily protected five per cent of their
forest lands, and manage reception centres for visitors giving information
on forest wildlife, management, and commercial timber use. Instead
of protest cards, international environmental organisations send
delegates to Finland to learn about the new sophisticated sustainable
forestry.
…
or not
Finland’s
forest conservation goals remain largely rhetorical. Instead of
conservation action, the majority of the forest sector concentrates
on denying the problem. Conservation programmes are decided on political
rather scientific grounds, with the main aim of giving the impression
of much action, although the percentage of protected forest hardly
rises nor as a consequence do declining species recover. Despite
scientific evidence to the contrary, Finnish officials continue
to extol Finnish forest management as progressive and sufficient
for conservation of biodiversity.
South
of Lapland and Oulu Province the amount of protected forest remains
at the 2002 level of less than two per cent, mostly in small fragments
of little value for biodiversity. Development of these areas for tourism,
recreation or cultural interest fails and the accompanying jobs do
not materialise – partly because Finland’s reputation as an environmentally
conscious country declines in tandem with species extinctions within
her forests. There is hardly any forest over 100 years old outside
protected areas, as the cutting age has been progressively lowered
to maximise profits. Abroad, the "Finnish conservation model"
has been noted and countries seeking to avoid their conservation responsibilities
cite Finland as their example. With the disappearance of natural forests,
thousands of species continue to go extinct worldwide.
[Excerpt
from an NGO-publication Palaako elävä metsä?]
