Raakut | “Hukkajoki sped up”: Forestry professionals get access to accurate raw data

Forest management associations within a month, they will have access to accurate information about where there are rakaki, i.e. river pearl mussels, all over Finland.

The information helps to take the raw materials into account already at the stage when the forest owner starts thinking about where and what kind of trees to sell from his land. Usually, a local forestry association is asked to be a partner in the planning.

In response, an employee of the forest management association can see from his computer or mobile phone right at the beginning of the planning, whether there are any scratches on the forest owner’s land.

This is a big improvement compared to the current situation, where the information about the forest has only become available after the so-called forest use notification has been submitted. At that point, there may be only ten days before the logging starts, and everything has already been thought out, down to the driving lines of the forest machines: whether to cut across the stream or whether to choose a longer and more expensive route, where water crossings are not necessary.

In August, in Suomussalmi’s Hukkajoki, the information about the raw materials reached the forest owner, forest machinery entrepreneur and wood buyer Stora Enso at the very last minute. At that time, for one reason or another, it was not taken into account. Now overrunning thousands of animals and ruining the habitat is being investigated as a serious nature conservation crime.

Bruises were one of a total of approximately 2,600 endangered or watchful species whose information was requested by Metsänhoitoyhtiðinten Palvelu oy at the end of August. There is also a small group of vigorous, but protected species.

For example, Metsähallitus’ nature services manage and decide on the use of the most comprehensive raw data.

Metsänhoitoyöhtiðinen Palvelu oy has requested similar information before, but then it took longer to get the answers. Rääkku information has also been included, but incomplete.

Now the answers arrived quickly, to the point of breaking.

“On Tuesday, I received a message that the data can be downloaded. I think that Hukkajoki sped up”, says the systems expert Jari Jordan From Metsänhoitoyhíttisten Palvelu oy.

According to Jordan, it takes a few weeks to transfer the data to the forest management associations’ own Leafpoint system, after which they are available to every employee. They use the information in planning fellings, but cannot hand it over directly to landowners.

The transfer restriction applies to so-called sensitive species information, which is encrypted or roughed-up, imprecisely offered from ordinary citizens. Examples include, in addition to raw streams, nesting trees of large birds of prey or, for example, the habitats of anemones.

Metsähallitus in the nature services, requests for material concerning raccoons and many other species are handled by a special expert in nature conservation Kaisa Junninen.

According to Junninen, there have been attempts to distribute accurate raw data to forest management associations and the forest industry before.

In Hukkajoki, it appeared that, despite this, the information was not available until the last tinga.

The reason turned out to be a technical error.

“It dropped about half of the raw data,” says Junninen.

The error has now been fixed.

At the same time, it was decided to distribute the raw data to forest professionals from the entire area of ​​Finland, including state lands.

Hukkajoki since then, large forest companies have also requested raw and other threatened information.

For example, in September, Stora Enso first asked for only raw data. They are the company’s director of communications Ingrid Peuran including already used.

Later in September, Stora Enso also requested the same set of 2,600 species as Metsänhoitoyhtiðinten Palvelu oy. The answers have come, but the company had not yet received permission to download the data on Tuesday.