One of the world’s largest producers of paper, pulp, and engineered wood products has overestimated its forest carbon sink and must now reduce tree felling by at least 25%. If it fails to do so, it risks running foul of an EU mandate to achieve carbon neutrality by 2035.
That is according to Syke, a research institute connected to the Finnish Environmental Ministry, which warns that Finand’s target of harvesting 80 million cubic metres of timber is “widely optimistic” with agreed-upon carbon targets “nearly impossible.”
It reveals that Finland’s land use and forestry industry is now a net source of emissions – with Finland rapidly expanding logging concessions (to 75 million cubic metres in 2022 and 67.8 million cubic metres last year) after the EU sanctioned Russian wood over the Ukraine war.
Earlier this year, Metsa Wood sold its substantial assets in Russia, formally bringing to a close Finland’s reliance on Russian fibre for high-volume pulp, paper and plywood products. It comes as Finland is increasingly looking westward to the EU and is looking to develop higher-value, lower-volume products. (Photo Credit: 2402517763 via Shutterstock Images)
Instead, Syke calculates that the sustainable amount of felling should be just 60-62 million cubic metres of timber every year – which would lead to a revised net sink of 21 million tons of carbon dioxide by 2035.
“Against this background, it is challenging to say the least. If logging is not limited, it is starting to look nearly impossible to achieve unless something revolutionary is done in other emission sectors.”
Sampo Soimakallio, a senior researcher at Syke.
Further complicating climate targets, Soimakallio points out that Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s decision to reduce the number of biofuel distributors required to blend petrol with diesel has made lowering greenhouse emissions even more difficult.
Finland’s ticking carbon bomb
It comes as Kai Mykkänen, the country’s outgoing Minister of Climate and the Environment, warned that Finland – home to forest giants UPM, Stora Enso, and Metsa – must dramatically reduce logging to address a 20 million-tonne carbon headache.
“The fact is that according to the current models, the land use sector sink will only recover sufficiently if the logging level falls significantly from the current level. This is a major question of whether that is desirable and what kind of guidance tools the state has to do it,” he said.
“These will not be easy decisions for any government; that’s clear that’s not easy,” Mr Mykkänen said. “Let’s say that two or three pulp mills in eastern Finland will be closed. These are people’s jobs. People’s difficulties. It’s so find alternatives to them in these areas as it is, but we have to go in that direction.”
Wood processing makes up more than 4% of Finland’s GDP. Here, on Lake Saimaa, felled logs are transported using ‘wood rafting.’
As it stands, forest products make up 4% of Finland’s GDP, with Finland also importing huge volumes of wood from nearby Latvia (41%), Estonia (30%), and Sweden (17%). To learn more about the Finnish forest products industry, click here for Wood Central’s special feature.
