Benefit: Recreation, experience

Nearly all Finns (96%) report taking part in outdoor activities. On average, these are pursued two to three times a week resulting in a total of 170 outdoor recreation events per year.

More than half of the population walk, swim and cycle in nature, pick wild berries as well as spend time on the beach and summer cottage. During a ten year period 2000 to 2010 the share of older people (65 to 74 years) engaging in outdoors activities increased in particular. Fastest growing forms of outdoor activity include Nordic walking, running, recreational forest management and bird watching.   


Number of people engaging in recreational fishing has been decreasing, but remains, nevertheless, quite high. More than 30% of the population report fishing at least once a year. On the contrary, the number of hunters has been increasing quite steadily for the past decades and amounts to more than 300 000 Finns at the moment.

Visits in national parks have more than doubled since 2001. Also the number of national parks has increased from 33 parks to 37 between 2001 and 2013. This does not, nevertheless, explain the increasing trend altogether – the absolute amount of visits has increased also. In 2013 there were a total of 2.3 million visits in the Finnish national parks.

There were altogether 5.4 million visits in the state-owned conservation and hiking areas in 2013. About 42% of these visits took place in national parks, 7% in national hiking areas and 51% in other conservation areas.

 

 

 

Outdoor statistics. The Natural Resources Institute Finland.

Recreational fishery. The Natural Resources Institute Finland.

Hunting. The Natural Resources Institute Finland.

Kansallispuistojen, valtion retkeilyalueiden ja muiden virkityskäytöllisesti merkittävimpien Metsähallituksen hallinnoimien suojelualueiden ja retkeilykohteiden käyntimäärät. Metsähallituksen ASTA-asiakastietojärjestelmä. [In Finnish]

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Updated (15.01.2015)