FO17 Nature management in commercial forests

>> Background information

Development

Since late 1990s several new methods of nature management have been introduced to commercial forestry. Two of the most important ones are the forest certification criteria, defined either by the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes (PEFC) or Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), as well as the preservation of valuable habitats as defined in the Forest Act.

Of the two certification schema applied in Finland the PEFC scheme is by far the most widely used. Approximately 95% of the country's commercial forests have been certified according to its criteria. In terms of biodiversity, perhaps the potentially most effective criteria of the PEFC scheme concerns the number and quality of retention trees in regeneration areas. Monitoring results from privately owned forests show that the volume of retained trees has varied between 3-4 m3/ha during the past decade while the average number of trees has increased from 7-8 to 11-12 per hectare. More trees are in fact retained than what is required by the criteria (5 per ha), but they are normally quite small in size.

Altogether 0.6% of all privately owned forests were defined as especially valuable in 2007. The Forest Act prohibits the changing of the characteristic features of these habitats.