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WORLDWIDE
FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS
Finishing
Off Finland's Old Growth
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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org
http://forests.org/ -- Forest
Conservation Archives & Portal
10/24/00
OVERVIEW
& COMMENTARY
Europe,
America, Australia and other over-developed regions lose much
of
their credibility in espousing forest conservation in developing
countries,
as they continue to polish off their last remaining old-
growth. Finland is a good example-with about 5
percent of its old-
growth
forests left, half is at risk of immediately being logged.
Many
species in Finland that are old-growth forest dependent have
become
extinct and 700 others are endangered.
But commercial logging
of the
last remaining fragments-some of the most significant old-
growth
remaining in all of Europe-continues at a frenzied pace. Be
careful
though when you point fingers. It's
worth noting that most
devastation
of old-growth forests in Finland and other boreal regions
is due
to "a non-stop demand for paper products in the developed
world." Over-consumption of forest products derived
from liquidation
of the
Earth's ecological life support systems threatens the
Planet's,
and our children's, well-being.
g.b.
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TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Old growth thins in the old country
Source: Copyright 2000, Environmental News Network
Date: October 17, 2000
Byline: Silja J.A. Talvi
By all
appearances, Finland is resplendent in its verdant beauty.
A flat
country with expansive, marine-clay plains, low plateaus and
small
hills, 76 percent of Finland is covered by dense forest and
woodland
areas. About 188,000 sparkling lakes and nearly as many
small
islands dot the picturesque landscape.
Nature,
it has always seemed, has been high on the list of Finland's
priorities.
But the
country's reputation as an environmentally-responsible
country
and a bona fide pioneer in sustainable commercial timber
production
has been tarnished amid accusations by environmentalists
that
most of the Finland's old-growth forests have been chopped down
in
frenzied pursuit of logging dollars.
The
heavy toll that state-authorized old-growth logging has taken on
biodiversity
within Finland's unique boreal and hemiboreal ecosystems
- the
predominantly coniferous Finnish forests are also referred to
as
Western taiga - has sparked public outcry and generated ongoing
campaigns
from several Finnish and Scandinavian environmental non-
governmental
organizations.
"In
Finland, many species have become extinct, and over 700 old-
growth
forest-dependent species have become endangered as a result of
logging,"
says Mila Hulsi-Heathfield, a Finnish campaigner with
Greenpeace
Nordic in Stockholm. "Regardless, the logging of old-
growth
forests continues. Only roughly 5 percent of Finland's old-
growth
forests are left, and half of that is at risk of being logged
right
now."
Much of
the remaining old-growth forest is situated on land owned by
the
state-owned Mets„hallitus, or Forest and Park Service, which has
managed
forests in Finland for the past century. The oldest protected
areas were
established more than 60 years ago.
Responding
to concern from academics, researchers and environmental
groups,
the Finnish Council of State designated a new old-growth
forest
protection program in 1996. This program covers a total land
area of
344,000 hectares, according to the FPS.
But
half of the remaining old-growth forests were left out of the
protection
program, says Matti Liimatainen, forest campaigner for the
Finnish
Nature League.
Not so,
says Juha M„kinen, director of communications for FPS. "All
old-growth
forests are protected, either by the official protection
program
or in landscape ecological planning," he says, referring to a
forestry
management approach that strives to take ecological,
commercial
and social aspects into account.
The
battle between FPS and environmental groups, insists M„kinen, is
over
"second-class" forests that do not possess the ecological
characteristics
to classify them as old-growth.
The FPS
itself is split into various departments, including its
forestry
unit (which oversees forest management and logging) and a
nature
protection unit that has often worked in concert with
environmental
groups to try to halt clear-cutting of old-growth
forests.
"Every
15th of Finland's known species is threatened," the nature
protection
unit notes in its own materials. "Almost one-half of these
species
are threatened because of forestry practices. The large
numbers
of endangered forest species is a signal that it is now vital
to
protect the last surviving tracts of old-growth forest in order to
safeguard
the ecosystems and biodiversity."
To curb
the logging, environmentalists have responded with
demonstrations,
civil disobedience, letter-writing efforts and
multilingual
Internet campaigns. In the fall of 1999, an ad hoc
group,
Artists for the Old-Growth Forests, staged a high-profile
rally
in Helsinki. More than 150 prominent artists threw their
support
behind the campaign.
"This
is a question not only of biodiversity and extinction of
hundreds
of forest species ... (but also of) the people's
environment,"
says Liimatainen of the Helsinki-based FNL.
A
sparsely populated, headstrong republic that won its independence
from
Russia in 1917 and suffered through its share of subsequent
national
struggles, modern-day Finland - a nation slightly smaller
than
the state of Montana - boasts a stable parliamentary democracy
and
many social welfare programs. The nation's highly literate, cell-
phone-dependent,
computer-savvy population numbers just over 5
million
and is governed by its first female president, Tarja Halonen.
Urban
dwellers typically make annual treks to commune with nature
during
the warm, luminous summer months. Finns often spend weeks or
even
months in kes„m”kkeja, simple cottages that allow families the
time
and place to pick berries and mushrooms, enjoy saunas and
indulge
in boating trips and lakeside picnics.
The
strong connection that Finns appear to feel toward their
environment
is also evidenced by the country's long-standing
traditions
of recycling, low-impact hiking and camping, and a
preponderance
of natural, non-toxic household cleansers and
unbleached
paper products.
But as
the nation recovered from a deep recession in the early 1990s
and
experienced newfound affluence, some of these common-sense,
environmentally-friendly
patterns have been pushed aside.
The
government-subsidized forestry industry is credited with helping
to
build Finland's national economy. Today, that industry generates a
significant
portion of the nation's $43 billion export economy.
Currently,
more than 50 percent of FPS' annual timber yield is sold
to two
dominant Finnish-based forestry corporations, Stora Enso and
UPM-Kymmene.
Recent merger acquisitions suggest that these
corporations
are aiming for a greater global presence in the forestry
industry.
Many
Finns are proud of their nation's thundering economic growth,
evidenced
by cell-phone technology leader Nokia, heavy machinery
producer
Ahlstr”m and the nation's various paper, cellulose and pulp-
manufacturing
corporations. At the same time, a decreasing number of
jobs in
the timber and paper-producing industry in some towns has
left
many citizens blaming forest protection efforts rather than
increased
mechanization, cost-cutting corporate decisions and other
factors.
"The
local people are very tired of the pressure forest activists
have
practiced," says FPS' M„kinen, in reference to Kainuu, a
fiercely
contested Northern region of Finland where environmental
groups
have tried to expand protected forest areas.
"I'd
say that this questions divides Finns in two. Some are strongly
against
further protection," admits FNL's Liimatainen. "But we feel
that
there is enough support for us to keep the issue up."
Liimatainen
points out that the FNL continues to receive urgent
letters
and phone calls from all over Finland from those areas where
old-growth
or younger "natural state" forests, mires and bird-nesting
areas
are being threatened by logging. According to WWF Finland,
threatened
animal species include wolves, bears, lynx, otters, flying
squirrels
and forest reindeer.
Environmental
groups in Sweden and Norway face similar challenges to
those
faced by their Finnish counterparts in halting logging in
unprotected
old-growth forests.
"The
old-growth loggings in Finland we see today are part of the
conversion
of the last remaining fragments of old-growth forests.
More
than 90 percent of the forest land in Fennoscandia (Norway,
Sweden
and Finland) has been converted to intensely managed
secondary
forests," says Ola Larsson, information coordinator of the
Taiga
Rescue Network. The Swedish group represents an international
network
of non-governmental organizations and indigenous peoples
working
for the protection and sustainable use of boreal forests.
Finnish
and Russian environmental groups have also joined forces to
bring
particular attention to the dynamic, biologically diverse
greenbelt
that occupies the border between the two countries. The
greenbelt
crosses three boreal zones, stretching from the Gulf of
Finland
in the south to the Arctic Ocean in the north. Despite the
unique
ecological qualities of this area, logging in old-growth
forests
on both sides of the border is common, according to
environmental
groups.
Environmentalists
in Scandinavia stress that the devastation of old-
growth
forests in boreal regions feeds a non-stop demand for paper
products
in the developed world. A large proportion of the global
trade
flow of wood, pulp and paper goes directly from boreal forest
regions
(Canada, Scandinavia and Russia), to the three main consuming
regions:
western Europe, the United States and Japan. Put together,
the
inhabitants of these three regions constitute only 25 percent of
the
global population and yet consume roughly 75 percent of the
world's
paper supplies.
A
version of this story first appeared in E/The Environmental
Magazine.
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