Sustainable Use of Forests

Without the forest, we could not survive.

Ecosystem services produced by the forest, including clean air, water and soil yield, trees, berries, mushrooms, photosynthesis and the nutrient cycle, as well as carbon binding, make the globe liveable for us.

and one of the most forested countries in the world.

Approximately 86 per cent of the Finland’s surface area is covered by forest.

Globally, the boreal coniferous zone is not a particularly endangered ecosystem.

The endangered status of forest types in Finland is mainly due to the dwindling of old-growth forests, and to the ensuing reduction in the number of large and decaying trees.

Fossil fuels such as coal and oil contain carbon bound in ancient organisms.

When we burn fossil fuels, this carbon is released into the atmosphere, reducing the amount of thermal radiation that escapes from the Earth into space.

As a result, our climate warms up.

The process of photosynthesis in trees binds carbon: trees take carbon dioxide from the air and water from the soil, using sunlight to turn these into sugar for growth.

In Finnish forests, approximately 1,300 tons of carbon is bound in the soil and approximately 800 million tons in trees.

If a car is, on average, driven more than 18,000 km a year, releasing approximately 3,000 kg of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere.

In order to bind these carbon dioxide emissions, an area of pine trees 70 m x 70 m in size is needed.

Old-growth forests that have developed naturally bind 2-4 times more carbon than a commercial forest.

By the time a forest is 12 years old, it starts binding more carbon than it releases.

Photosynthesis produces nutrients that the tree uses for growth, and, thus, a young, growing forest binds great quantities of carbon dioxide.

In Finland, fire safety regulations for blocks of flats built of wood were amended in 2011.

The new regulations make it possible to build eight-storey blocks of flats out of wood.

Carbon compounds released by trees may form aerosols in the atmosphere, leading to increased cloud cover.

Clouds increase the amount of radiation that is reflected from the atmosphere back into space, thus reducing atmospheric warming.

The declining amount of decayed wood is the primary reason that species are becoming endangered.

The average amount of deadwood in Finnish forests is 5.4 m³ per hectare, whereas in old-growth forests in a natural state, the amount of decayed wood varies between 20 and 120 m³ per hectare.

Degrading logging residue or the branches, needles and roots of felled trees release nutrients for the remaining trees.

The more logging residue that is left behind in the forest, the less the tree growth is affected.

More than one half of Finnish forests are privately owned: one family out of seven owns some forest.

One-third of Finnish forests are owned by the state and 8 per cent by companies.

The remainder is owned by municipalities, parishes and various organisations.

A Japanese study claims that hiking in the forest for one to two days at a time will increase the number of killer cells that are vital for human immunological defence mechanisms.

Natural killer cells, or NKs, are, for example, able to destroy cancer cells.

An Austrian study indicates that in a classroom of wood, the pupils’ heart rate is six beats a minute slower than that of pupils in a so-called normal classroom.

A heart that is beating slowly wears down less and lasts longer.

The financial yield produced by the Finnish forest sector is approximately EUR 6 billion a year.

With this sum, the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture could discharge its duties for a year, including the provision of student financial support and general education.

Studies show that 81 endangered species can profit from retention trees left in open tree fellings, especially aspens.

In regeneration fellings carried out on state land, 5-10 m³ of the retention trees per hectare should be left, and, at special sites, up to 20 m³ per hectare should be left.

A total of 9 per cent of our forests are strictly protected.

To stop more forest species from becoming endangered, we should increase the share of protected forests to around 10 per cent everywhere within Finland.

Commercial forest management techniques that safeguard biodiversity could reduce the need for protected areas by 0.5-2 per cent.

Life on Earth is based on using natural resources.

Our current way of life has increased the use of natural resources: each Finnish person consumes approximately 100,000 kg of natural resources every year.

The amount of water required to manufacture a ton of newsprint has declined from 100,000–150,000 litres to 7,000–15,000 litres.

The water is recycled 18 times during the process before it becomes sewage.

The value of public procurements is approximately EUR 23 billion in Finland.

The Government is currently encouraging procurements of wood-based products that are environmentally sustainable.

Procurement guidelines already exist for paper products, furniture and buildings.

After the most recent ice age some 10,000 years ago, birch and pine, or so-called pioneer trees, spread from the south to the current area of Finland.

Spruce trees started becoming more widespread throughout eastern parts of the country approximately 5,000 years ago, once the climate became similar to what it is today.

Walking in the forest and picking berries and mushrooms are public access rights for which the landowner’s permission is not required.

However, a person must not become a nuisance or cause a disturbance while exercising his or her public access rights.

Limited, non-renewable raw materials can be replaced by wood.

Wood is domestically produced and endurable, it can be repaired and recycled, and it burns and decays without harming the environment.

The xylitol found in the birch trees protects our teeth from cavities, the lignan found in spruce trees reduces the risk of heart disease and the plant sterol found in pine trees lowers cholesterol values.

Birch and spruce pulp fibre can be used to make viscose fibres for clothes.

Processing wood requires less energy than processing metal or concrete.

For example, it takes 3.5 times more energy to manufacture a steel bar than a timber bar, while it takes 15 times more energy to manufacture an aluminium bar.

Forestry consumes one-third of all electricity in Finland, while it is the largest producer of bioenergy: 70 per cent of the energy used by the industry comes from recycled, wood-based bioenergy.

...would keep 20 single-family houses warm for a year.

Bioenergy is mainly a by-product of a felling, because the branches and some of the stumps and trunk parts that are of no use to a sawmill or factory are chipped and made into fuel.

In wooden structures and furniture, carbon is stored for 40 years on average, but sometimes for up to hundreds of years: for example, the old wooden church of Petäjävesi in Central Finland, which has been designated a UNESCO world heritage site, was completed in 1765.

Approximately 15 million tons of carbon dioxide are stored annually in the products of the Finnish sawmill industry, which is equivalent to the yearly carbon dioxide emissions of all road transports.

If we doubled the use of timber in new buildings, harmful emissions into the atmosphere would be further reduced by the equivalent of the emissions produced in a city the size of 200 000 inhabitants.

The biofuels produced from rape seed, sugarcane and palm oil take arable land away from food production and speed up the destruction of rain forests.

Biofuel made from tree parts, cultivation residue and manure exploits raw materials that have already been used once.

The anthocyanins found in blueberries help to prevent cardiovascular diseases and maintain eye health.

The anthocyanin content of natural blueberries is four times that of cultivated blueberries.

There are approximately 60,000 arborescent plants growing on the globe. Human beings only exploit a couple thousand of them.

Twenty-two naturally growing tree species are found in Finnish forests. The tree species that are exploited the most are birch, spruce and pine.

Finnish forests grow approximately 100 cubic metres a year. More than 50 million cubic metres are exploited annually.

There is now more than 2,000 cubic metres of timber in our forests, more than at any time in the last 200 years.

Finnish forests are carbon sinks because we look after forest regeneration.

Destroying tropical forests increases carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere by approximately 20 per cent, because new trees are not planted to replace the felled trees.

In northwest Lapland, nature tourism produces revenue of approximately EUR 4 million for the municipal coffers, which is 20 times the amount spent on basic maintenance in the area.

The sums of money moving around in nature tourism nationwide amount to nearly EUR 1 billion.

Finland has 0.6 per cent of the world’s forests, 1.6 per cent of forest fellings in the world take place in Finland, and we produce less than a fifth of all printing and writing paper in the world.

The Finnish forest sector accounts for approximately 5 per cent of our GNP.

In other parts of the world, this share is around one per cent.

One Finn out of ten makes his/her living from the forest industry or from sectors serving the forest industry.

Today, forest use in Finland is governed by the Forest Act of 1997, the Nature Conservation Act and forest management recommendations.

Such pieces of legislation as the Antiquities Act, the Water Act and the Reindeer Husbandry Act must be taken into account in forest management.

One of the oldest sculptures found in Finland is a wooden elk’s head carved at Lehtojärvi, near Rovaniemi, approximately 8,400 years ago.

The elk was an important game animal for stone-age Finns. In addition to various types of sculptures, the elk is also depicted in rock paintings.

One cubic metre of wood produces slightly more than 1,000 kilometres of nano pulp.

Thanks to nanotechnology, wood can be made into products that are tougher than steel and as light as plastic.

In the olden days, the forest provided everything you needed in life, from timber for building to food.

You also had to show respect to the forest spirits and gods for the forest to yield its plenty.