Forests
Finland's forests have been intensively harvested over the last few decades. Despite the loss of land after the last wars, its forest reserves are now greater than ever before in the 20th century, and they are continuing to grow. Trends in the forest reserves have been systematically monitored ever since the 1920s by means of forest inventories at approximately 10 year intervals. Finnish forests are being capably managed over their entire 100 year rotation period, mainly in accordance with forest management programmes drafted for individual holdings.
Family forestry is the cornerstone of Finland's forestry. Three quarters of the wood raw material used by industry comes from private forests. Ownership is divided over a broad spectrum of the population, every fifth Finnish family owning some forest. The Finnish state owns about a quarter of the country's land area, i.e. some 9 million hectares. Of this, 3.3 million hectares are in commercial use for forestry. Nevertheless, these managed forests are truly multiple use forests, as they are accessible to all Finns for recreation. The management and use of the state-owned managed forests are the task of the Forestry unit of Metsähallitus.
The utilisation and management of commercial forests are based on long-term planning. The methods used in Finland are unique: Natural Resources Planning and Landscape Ecological Planning, combined with participatory planning involving local residents and organisations. The various dimensions of sustainability - ecological, economic and social sustainability - are assured by the use of these new planning methods. (Metsähallitus, 2000)
