Not only that but Finland is practically all forest anyway...I guess we could bulldoze Helsinki and plant forest there? But, yes, your original point is also correct - this policy doesn't make much sense here.
Well it's not without merit. I'm not sure about Finland but the way forestry is run in Sweden most forests are closer to farming with pine trees than actual forests. Just massive mono-crops. Biodiversity takes a pretty big hit in these situations.
A monoculture of pine trees doesn't have a lot to offer to an ecosystem in the first place :( They can even harm because they make the ground acidic and hostile to many organisms... It's almost like we're trying to limit diversity 🤷♂️
I grew up surrounded by such "forests".
There is very little wildlife. Some mushrooms manage to grow as well, but desert of wood is a great description.
It's ironic: I live in Berlin and there's more species of trees on my street and in the graveyard next to our house (I'd guess 30-40 different types of trees). There are hedgehogs, foxes, squirrels, owls, woodpeckers, nightingales and more rare species that I don't know right in the middle of the city.
Yes. There are much better methods but it's slightly cheaper to just cut down a forest in one go. It's called Kalhygge in Swedish and they can go on forever and ever.
Interesting... I'm on Oregon and we don't do that here anymore. we'll do a section and another section and another section, but it turns out looking like a checkerboard.
Cool! That method is good, but with modern technology, as far as I understand the best method is to cut down every other tree and always leave some coverage.
I went down a YouTube rabbit hole about scything from this Swedish guy. Learned a lot about how the sensitive marshlands are losing biodiversity to Forrest. Even forests that are cut down will regrow saplings every year that dominate marsh plants unless you remove the roots.
This is exactly why forest statistics don't tell the whole picture.
Another issue is the lack of old growth.
In my country there is almost no old growth left but there is some trees for farming so "yay we have forests", but not really...
it's exactly the same in Finland. our biodiversity is shit and there are very little old untouched forests, despite having a massive amount of trees.
Also drying up all the swamps was a stupid move in hindsight.
The Finnish / Nordic special relation with nature is a joke.
> malaria in Sweden.
Isn't Sweden (as is most Europe) too cold for the malaria parasite to survive? Do you have any materials/documents for historical malaria cases there?
Yes you can find lots but you'll have to run through a translator. Here's for instance a reference by the Swedish health agency https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/smittskydd-beredskap/smittsamma-sjukdomar/malaria/ and one from Wikipedia https://sv.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malariamyggor
You could dig more if you search for 'malaria sverige.
Less than 2% is in natural state. Rest is planted forest, mostly pine and spruce.
Most Finns have never been to natural forest and don't even know about it.
Modern European forestry is still very low intensity farming. Far less impacts than most types of land use and biodiversity is always going to be very low in regions like Finland due to the northernness
Yeah 13% of our forests are protected, which like you said, is more than the rest of EU combined.
The absolute vast majority of our woods are tree plantations with shit biodiversity.
Comparing us to southerners wont change the reality, even if it makes you feel good.
Spruce and pine will outcompete all other trees in the latitudes you find in the top 3/4 of Sweden and most of Finland. Only the coasts and the mountains are any different.
This particular vote was about restoring wetlands in an attempt to slow down CO2 emissions from decaying peat. Admirable but the whole reasoning behind it is pretty flawed. The CO2 emissions reduction is very small and there's a reason why the wetlands were dyked to begin with
Depends. Some forests in the more hidden areas are grid forest. Others are refrown naturally by leaving several så tall trees standing lonesome in naked fields to regrow them.
> most forests are closer to farming with pine trees than actual forests. Just massive mono-crops.
Naturally grown old forests are pretty much massive mono-crops too dominated by one single climax species favouring the conditions (temps, soil type, dampness etc).
If at these latitudes you leave a large forest untouched by humans for centuries it will become an old forest and when it reaches its climax phase it will be dominated by a single tree species with very little or no other species. The dominant species outcompetes all other species, and in such forests other species cannot grow big and may only grow in niches such as temporarily in a hole left by a fallen dominant tree, or in niches left by a forest fire (though even a fire won't kill off the dominant trees).
In most of Finland and Sweden those dominant climax species are either spruce or pine, both conifers, and in parts of Southern Sweden also beech a deciduous species. If Finland and Sweden were left alone without any human touch in few centuries they would be covered by old climax forests of either pines or spruces (or beeches in Southern Scania). You wouldn't have for example large forests of birch - only in niches. Monoculture is the natural state with one very dominant species and other species growing in niches where ever they can.
However, the big difference with a natural old forest and a planted forest is the age and state of trees. Even if natural old forest is monoculture it has trees of different ages, and dead trees in different stages of decomposition. A planted forest does not typically have those, and that limits the biodiversity of animals, insects, plants, fungi etc that can live in such planted forest. So the biodiversity is not that much about tree species but about other species that can live and thrive in a forest.
And generally the millenia of human touch has been good for biodiversity: without humans large areas of Europe would be covered by monocultures of beech, pine or spruce. That was the natural state millenia ago. For example in parts of Finland we can still see the effects of centuries of hack&slash agriculture which gave a niche for birch and other deciduous species to thrive.
Which rises a question of what do we mean by nature restoration? Do we mean the actual natural state? Or the state nature used to be 2000 years ago? Or a century ago? Human touch has been present for millenia now so to which state are we going to restore?
Please tell me the source of your knowledge, as I first time hear that old forests are mono-crops. Of course some trees will dominate others, but mono-crops are mostly created by humans. Like you said, pine trees for forest industry.
Also I agree that the point of old forests is not really the trees, it is all the other things, that grows under them, or on the dead trees.
He's saying that boreal forests tend to be monoculture because at those latitudes spruce is the one that outcompetes everything. They also prevent any other species of new growth trees due to how their fallen needles acidify the soil. There's a reason for why old growth forests are mainly spruce over here.
When Georgia (the state, not the country) was first colonized, there were very large forests that basically nothing but pine. In the western US, there are immense stretches of forest that are made up almost entirely of [Ponderosa Pine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponderosa_pine_forest). Siberia has truly massive stretches of [forest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Siberian_taiga) that are made up almost completely of larch.
> This vast ecoregion is located in the heart of Siberia, stretching over 20° of latitude and 50° of longitude[1] (52° to 72° N, and 80° to 130° E).
...
> Vegetation consists mainly of vast, dense forests of Dahurian larch (Larix gmelinii), with Siberian larch (Larix sibirica) and hybrids between the Dahurian and Siberian larches (Larix x czekanowskii) occurring as one moves to the west
Canada has [massive forests](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boreal_forest_of_Canada) that are overwhelmingly spruce.
> The boreal region in Canada covers almost 60% of the country's land area.[2] The Canadian boreal region spans the landscape from the most easterly part of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador to the border between the far northern Yukon and Alaska. The area is dominated by coniferous forests, particularly spruce, interspersed with vast wetlands, mostly bogs and fens
That's just kindof how boreal forests work.
Yup. Generally speaking here in Finland we have broadleaf forests only on the southern coast and then mixed forests inland but majority is always spruce (in wetter areas) or scots pine (in more arid and sandy soil areas).
And most of those deciduous forests in the south are mostly due to human touch because only in rare circumstances can for example birch grow into a forest without getting outcompeted by spruce. Some of those are remnants of the old hack&slash agriculture that was practiced for centuries.
I'm no expert, but around Norway there's plenty of old forests. Most of them is almost exclusively pine or spruce. Spruce in areas with rich soil, pine in areas with sandy soil. Birch and a few other trees grow here and there, but rarely larger than a bush.
> Please tell me the source of your knowledge, as I first time hear that old forests are mono-crops. Of course some trees will dominate others, but mono-crops are mostly created by humans.
You're wrong. The natural state of forests in most of Europe is to be monocultures of single dominant tree species with niches for other tree species.
We still have some forests remaining untouched by humans since the de-glaciation in Europe. And guess what, they are monocultures dominated by beech!
You want a source? For example wikipedia:
"The **primeval beech forests of the Carpathians are also an example of a singular, complete, and comprehensive forest dominated by a single tree species - the beech tree**. Forest dynamics here were allowed to proceed **without interruption or interference since the last ice age**. Nowadays, they are amongst the last pure beech forests in Europe to document the undisturbed postglacial repopulation of the species, which also includes the unbroken existence of typical animals and plants."
Here's the UNESCO world heritage site:
"World Heritage Beech Forests
**Once they grew everywhere**, but today beech forests belong to the most endangered habitats.
**Beech forests are Europe’s natural wilderness**. The World Heritage Site comprises the few remaining primeval beech forests and centuries-old European beech forest areas unaltered by humans.
The European Beech is endemic to Europe. Two things make it particularly special: **It is extremely assertive and exceptionally adaptable.**"
After de-glaciation most of Europe was covered with monoculture beech forests. The only reason we have for example forests of big, old oaks instead of monocultures of beeches is human touch. For millenia humans have preferred oak for building material and used beech as firewood. And you cannot have a forest of oaks without humans tending to it and removing the beeches which would eventually outcompete the oaks in long term leaving only niches for oaks.
Have you ever been in an old natural beech forest? Very little else grows there because the big beeches shadow the ground and it's too dark for most plants. Here's a picture of an old beech forest floor: https://mediaim.expedia.com/destination/2/7b49a33ee366e06e58eaa956f74bf8f2.jpg
That is not to say that a beech forest would not have biodiversity, it does but not in the sense of tree species but in the sense that it provides habitats for many species of animals, insects, fungi etc to live and thrive.
And in most of Finland and Sweden the natural dominant species would be conifers pine or spruce (and beech in Southern Scania).
I don't think most people were talking about tree biodiversity in the first place, but things like animals and insects, and other non-tree plants. There barely any old forests in Finland, and places like swamps and their biodiversity are also suffering.
This is very true as I already mentioned in my first comment. An old forest, even if it's monoculture of one dominant species, has more biodiversity than a planted tree farm. That is because an old natural forest has more trees of different ages and dead trees at different stages of decomposition.
Would be interested in you source(s) too, even though I feel like you're right. We see this in Germany too: oldest are natural beech forests, then for industry fir & spruce monocultures were planted, all roughly same age, height as you described.
Ideally, we would need to leave as much land untouched as we can from now on. This also intertwines with reducing wood consumption and increasing recycling/upcycling.
I wrote another comment with some basic sources here: https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1dikesx/why_are_finnland_and_sweden_against_the/l95alhn/
>Ideally, we would need to leave as much land untouched as we can from now on.
I have to disagree. In most of Europe the natural state is monocultures of beech, spruce or pine.
Humans have impacted and tented forests for millenia in Europe. That's why Europe is not covered by forests of only beech, spruce or pine. If in Europe we want diverse forests of many tree species thriving in them it can only happen with humans tending to those forests.
It's not about planting forests. It's about making more land area to it's natural state, meaning blocking ditches, making rivers and streams back to their original state and path, and making old dried bogs to bogs again.
I think main sentiment here is (without actually reading that regulation, or saying it is 100% true necessarily, just that what moods people have about this): "Our nature has already mostly been left lot closer to it's natural state, even if it is not untouched, so why are we required to restore it same amount more towards untouched, if rest of Europe will as result only barely get to level where we are, and we will be pushed to remain as far ahead most countries, and we are bit worried about how if routine forms of kind of 'absolute increases in this field, with no consideration to start level' then next or one after that might actually push us to need to try to complete some unobtainable goal, while others still have pretty easy time implementing theirs, since they have so much so absolutely far from original state areas."
Thing is that most of Europe apparently used to be forest, but most of countries ended up completely changing their land type, while nordic countries are lot closer to that "still covered with forest". So there is bit of sentiment with "well how about we start talking major actions here, after for example France and Germany have 60% of their total area covered with forest, so they are just 10% units behind our current 70%".
(Based on Wikipedia Germany has about 32% coverage and France (when counting its area in Europe only) 31% coverage, so to gain 60% they would need to double amount of forest in their area, also funnily enough kind of actually kind of inverse % to Finland).
But yeah all countries could use at least some improving, I want to stress that I CAN NOT comment on how reasonable or unreasonable that regulation is, since I have to admit I have not checked what it covers and in what way and how much it is "we all just do this same thing, EZ", or "If we precision do these things in this kind of regions and so..".
Ultimately I guess there is also little bit of bit strangeish historical bitterness over "well they burned their forests and heavily modified their lands to get industrial growth and benefit, and now they want us to equally lift them up form there". Or so.
And yeah I also remember some cases where Finnish environmental authorities have been implementing earlier nature restoration regulations, and people being "my grandfather who I spent my childhood with cleared this small field, that I now have, with his bare hands with minimal tools, from being just full of rocks, to grow vegetables for his family to survive... now I got told that I need to turn it into rocky swamp again.. Instead of having it as feature and reminder it has my whole life been" or so situations, that while yeah we strictly do not need that field anymore, and sure that part could also be same swampy environment that part of surrounding areas are too, they might also in some cases (fortunately not that often) personal small tragedies of "but our family has had this for last 100 years.. Now do I need to start digging and carrying those stones back, stones that my grandfather took so massive effort to carry away from there".
But yeah things need to be done, and one of only potential ways they get done unfortunately usually is to show example, thing that sometimes feels that mostly all of EU is doing in several things.. like "we do not contribute to massive part of this problem, actually rather insignificant part, and we could do it with lighter approach, but heck to try to get other parts of world to improve, or to softly force them in nearby future, we need to now make this change that we apply to ourselves, so that we can then pressure others better, and use economical influence (causing there to be ready industry for things needed for this change, so others can get it easier and cheaper to follow, and so that industry might flip "why bother doing things with 2 sets of standards, if we can just do it way that is ok to EU, since others also accept it" that will result in others adapting it no matter if they decide or not).
I mean unfortunately since it is kind of delayed effect in some cases to places where it would be more critical and more important to implement as fast as possible. But hey masses of people and social structures and so work as they work, and our methods and tools to working with them are what they happen to be at moment.
Oh yeah also it might be worth noting: There is this mentality that is tied to certain social constructs with Finnish culture, where mostly Eu regulations hit the spot where they are handled as "not just law, but higher level commandment that needs to be rapidly implemented to full letter and intent of it, overriding local matters/decisions/things if they risk conflicting", so no EU regulation is taken as kind of "well they are suggesting, and this is goal we should be working towards, or we will attempt to reach this goal", but instead as "This WILL BE DONE, and it will be done completely and fully and at rate where we will be sure it is done before required date".
That has actually been building some sentiment where people have been getting impression and thinking that "well EU set this regulation mostly aimed to some other region of EU, and area it was set for is handling it as 'well neat recommendation we can maybe consider and follow when it is convenient to us' while we enforced it strictly and modified our way of living, even if it was not exactly that important if we do it, but since it was decided, we it has to be done. So did this only end up inconveniencing our lives and costing our money, while people that were misbehaving in way that this needed to be decided are still just mostly or partially ignoring this issue and maintaining problem behaviour".
That might rise from some random and rare cases, and might be completely or partially incorrect, but is still something that affects social interactions on individual and national scale.
Regardless thing is that Finland tends to see these as "if it is decided, at least that much HAS TO HAPPEN in way that it has to be reached AT LATEST AT DATE DESIGNATED".
So when weighting reaction it is seen as "Is this something IN THIS EXACT form, that we want to be absolute limits that will not be bent or crossed potentially ever again, ((possibly also considering:) along with it's likely followup decisions that will likely go through)".
Of course these are not 100% "This is how it is", but more about mentality in what these things are easily instinctively seen as and talked as. Or what people at least think they will be.
Forest restoration doesn't just mean planting new trees. It means adding more dead trees, more trees of different ages, more diversity in the tree species composition and more burnt wood for example. All ecologically important things lacking in the tree fields of Finland.
Fortunately at least baby steps in some things are being made towards this. (Might not be straight up important or noticeable large, but getting people to come to think of those things on instinctive level as something that just should be, instead of exotic things, is already important thing).
Recently saw that city set up one tree to be "coarse woody debris" in nearby small woods. With visibility to closeby road and walking path, with actual sizeable sign on it's side about matter, and how it is required as part of improving biodiversity.
Was neat, since there it will actually be visible, people will out of curiosity read the sign, then whenever they see that tree they will remember why and what it is. --> They get trained to more readily accept that as thing that needs to be and exists. --> it will slowly work it's way to making more acceptance and better adoption of biodiversity improving things to populaition.
A lot of restorations are currently being done, especially with swamp restorations, since swamps are significant ecological hotspots for diversity in Finland and also historically heavily abused for agriculture and peat production.
To be fair there isn't much biodiversity left in Finnish forests, there aren't many old growths left and most of the forests are just fields of trees.
I know Finland has the largest areas of protected forests in Europe, but it also has the largest tree fields
Most of our forests are commercial meaning they get cut down often for profit, this new ruling would mean we have to leave more forest untouched which would decrease profits but keep our nature healthier
This. The reason why some people here are so opposed to the climate and nature regulations is because they feel that the big countries like Germany and France want to turn Finland into some bog reservate with no agriculture or forest industry while they keep their coal plants and car industry.
I imagine its pretty similar in Finland.
In Sweden we take pretty good care of the forest and almost everyone having forest have "Important eco system" parts of forest that's forbidden to cut.
Now EU wants to dictate how we take care of our forest.
First result on Google copying your title into the search bar:
*Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden voted against the law, while Belgium abstained. They criticised the cost of the proposal and said it would place too many administrative burdens on them.*
And Belgium abstained because Flanders (mostly right/far right) is against the new law while Wallonia and Brussels (left/moderate right) are in favour.
You answered my question. Saw the only abstained voted and my first thought was: both communities did not agree on the same stance?
So voting in EU is not a federal prerogative but lies with needed consent of the other (6?) government?
Things like that are decided in cooperation between the Federal minister responsible for the environment and the three regional ministers who are also responsible for the environment in their respective regions . So there are “only” four ministers responsible here. Which, I believe, is the maximum. There isn’t any case with five or six responsible ministers.
It depends on the topic. Belgium is divided twice: in regions and in communities.
Regions are based on the territory and handle authorities like streets, nature, buildings...
Communities are based on the people and their language handle authorities like health care, education, culture...
There are three regions: Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia.
There are three communities: Dutch, French and German.
Brussels is served by both the French and Dutch speaking communities. For territorial authorities in the German-speaking towns in East-Belgium the Walloon government is responsible
Each region and each community would have their own parliament and government. But the Dutch community and Flanders region decided to merge governments. This results in 5 governments: Flemish government, French-speaking community government, Walloon government, Brussels government and German-speaking community government. Combined with the federal government as well, we have 6 governments in total.
Anyway, long story short. In this case, with an EU law about nature, the region governments need to agree: Flemish, Brussels and Wallonia governments.
If it was a law about for example education, it would have been the community governments: Flemish, French-speaking community and German-speaking governments.
[(from 2023) All French-speaking MEPs voted in favor of the legislative proposal on nature restoration. Including Benoît Lutgen (Les Engagés), who deviated from the hard line taken by his group, the European People's Party. On the Dutch-speaking side, the CD&V, the liberal Vautmans and the Vlaams Belang voted against.](https://www.lalibre.be/international/europe/2023/07/12/comment-ont-vote-les-belges-sur-la-loi-sur-la-restauration-de-la-nature-PWQEID2A2RB4XGZW34U3OXDJZE/?outputType=amp)
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This is often true for laws that sound like common sense: it's expensive and a lot of work to implement.
You'll find someone vote against anything that "makes sense" for many reasons, including "peace in Gaza", "no more cigarettes" and "car free cities".
Man lately Hungary is getting me fucking triggered. That fat f*cker Orban will vote against anything just for the sake of it… Why aren’t we kicking him out? He’s just profiting from EU while kneeling in front of Putin and his henchmen.
Tbh. in this case he is arguably correct.
Hungary has pretty decent forests. International law level regulations feel like a tad bit of an overreach.
To put it mildly people eouldnt eelcome german levels of bureucracy - requiring license to cut down a tree on their property, leafing to multiple forest owners having to bamd together to afford cutting trees by qualified personnel.
everything i could say has been said a billion times: that 3 million people are keeping him in power, that peopel are hopeless to vote, that there has historically been no better alternative, et cetera
if a hungarian speaks english, theyre in a minority, if theyre also on reddit, thats even rarer, u will only find anti orbán people on reddit or among the younger populace, all that might cast a distorted image to foreigners
No need to be extreme here. Do they veto a lot of things? Sure. Is it every single time? Not even half, thats just not in the news cos it’s not interesting.
Someone said that the cost of this regulation would be 40x more expensive for Finland than for Germany (adjusted per capita). Finland is one of the world's most forested areas, so strict nature restoration rules would have huge costs. I'm no expert, so I can't say how reliable these numbers are.
Actually onlu about 10% of the costs cover forestry, most of the costs are from wetlands for example swamps. Out of Finlands whole area a third is covered by swamps and of which about a half is drained.
I imagine that if that would be the system, then more members would have been against this. But if you are a country that is substantially less impacted financially with this decision? "Awesome, where can I sign!?"
I'm all for preserving nature and creating healthy diverse forests, but this whole law sure sounded like countries who've destroyed their own forests 100 years ago now want to preach to countries who still have forests, given that in Sweden and Finland the forests nowadays are pretty much fields of trees, not real, natural forests.
>82% of Austrians are in favor of this regulation
because let's be honest, it sounds good but nobody knows yet what the implications will mean in reality. We will see in the coming years.
Me too. Not that I am against it - I understand the basics of it, but understanding every single detail requires a lot of expert knowledge imo and I heavily doubt more than a few % of the 82 actually do. I can't say with confidence that I can support it tbh, I can just hope it's worth it.
But they don’t have the right to told her what to vote anyway so the sue has no chance to succeed and is a pr stunt more or less (which has already backfired)
It sadly is not that easy and law experts of all colors have very different opinions on whether it was lawful or not. And there are heavy arguments to both sides, for example the principle of unity that formally still exists and is against the vote, even though Vienna and Carinthia have verbally expressed their acknowledgement to a positive vote, it might not have any effect on the formal agreement.
It's gonna be a fun couple years with this.
If it were that clear law experts wouldn't be so split in their opinion, but yeah, random redditor #98762 is probably right and it's gonna be dismissed any second now.
Edit: [here](https://www.derstandard.at/story/3000000224823/schlacht-der-gutachter-hat-gewessler-das-recht-gebrochen-um-schmetterlinge-zu-schuetzen?ref=article) is an article in German that explains pretty well the different positions and why at least partially the matter will take some serious turns on all levels of judication.
To add some data to what others have already said. If we take population density (I used the numbers from [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_and_population_of_European_countries)) and the percentage of area that is forest (numbers from [Eurostat](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Forests,_forestry_and_logging)) do you get that the table below; in which Finland are 24 persons per km2 of forest and in Sweden there are 38. Third place is Latvia on 53 followed closely by Estonia on 54, and then a giant gap down to fifth place Lithuania on 124. France later comes in on 378 and Germany even later on 728. So the simple reason that Finland and Sweden voted no is that the costs per person will be by far the highest for them.
||
||
|**Country**|**People by km2 of forest**|
|Finland|24|
|Sweden|38|
|Latvia|53|
|Estonia|54|
|Lithuania|124|
|Bulgaria|174|
|Slovenia|181|
|Croatia|209|
|Austria|233|
|Spain|243|
|Greece|260|
|Romania|286|
|Slovakia|295|
|Portugal|306|
|France|378|
|Czechia|391|
|Poland|437|
|Hungary|495|
|Cyprus|521|
|Ireland|600|
|Italy|609|
|Germany|728|
|Luxembourg|744|
|Denmark |920|
|Belgium|1'741|
|Netherlands|4'240|
|Malta|170'000|
Your table is broken:
Country|People by km2 of forest
:--|--:
Finland|24
Sweden|38
Latvia|53
Estonia|54
Lithuania|124
Bulgaria|174
Slovenia|181
Croatia|209
Austria|233
Spain|243
Greece|260
Romania|286
Slovakia|295
Portugal|306
France|378
Czechia|391
Poland|437
Hungary|495
Cyprus|521
Ireland|600
Italy|609
Germany|728
Luxembourg|744
Denmark |920
Belgium|1'741
Netherlands|4'240
Malta|170'000
I deleted the | |around each row|, added a new line to each row, deleted the first line and added the alignment ":--|--:" after the first row.
Both are large countries with relatively low population, so there's a vast amount of land to be restored with small amount of people to pay for that restoration.
Also, most of the deforestation in Germany happened prior to 1950, the cut off date, during the industrial revolution, which is not the case with other countries which started industrialization after WWII. So Germany has a big economy and huge population, with relatively few forest to restore, while Finnland has a low population and smaller economy with a much larger area to reforest, plus the administration. It's just not fair.
It's the same kind of inequality we have in carbon reductions: sure, England and China (Africa, India, etc) both have to reduce their carbon footprints, but England already profited from kickstarting the industrial revolution and buring all the coal they had (and those carbon emissions are still in the athmosphere), and with the money they earnt, they ruled the world, now everyone telling China (Africa, India, etc..) to stop burning coal, because climate change. It does not work like that, without some kind of fairness principle, we won't meet carbon reduction targets, because China (Africa, India, etc..) will want to reach the same level of developpement the global North have achieved already.
The cut-off date of 1950 isn't present in the last version of the regulation. You are talking about an earlier draft.
It was removed because Finland wanted it to be removed. After it was removed, Finland still voted no.
We are basically the size of Germany with a population of new york city.
Most of Finland is either forest, lakes or bogs.
For crying out loud some of our towns look like forests with some houses in them.
To put it mildly this has made some of us to put it mildly outraged
> It's not the money spent that is the problem
It's also a problem. It's nearly billion a year of extra costs when we barely can even afford to maintain our healthcare.
Mostly I think the reasons are about the self governance issue and that this affects the nordic countries disproportionately. For example in the initial calculations of the cost of this desision would put Finland's costs as the third largest in the whole of EU. The costs directed to Finland in those estimates were a bit under 13 % of the whole package to a nation that has 1,8 % of EU GDP.
TL;DR: Disporpotionate costs and self determination
Sadly, this is the kind of things those opposing the EU in Norway has been talking about. You end up with a bunch of people down in Europe sitting and telling other people what they should do. And when that happens, you find out they are in a majority.
The difference is the Norwegian government is responsible for finances across Norway so when the cost overwhelms local business the government resolves that. The same is not true across the EU because it's not a fiscal union.
I'm not familiar enough with the EU, but if there isn't, then there should be some kind of limit what you can force a nation to spend thanks to a ruling. Personally I'm all for the EU, as long as it's fair and equal.
I think it would be better if this nature restoration law just included EU funding like the CAP. Fiscal union is kinda needed anyway if you're going to have a single currency.
Nice dream, unfortunately it’s never fair and equal to EVERYONE
Same reason why Sweden refuses the euro, and Norway doesn't give a damn about joining
The big fish benefit the most, namely Germany and France
I don't mean it has to be 1:1 equal, but you shouldn't be able to ask a country to pay multiple times more. I get that it's probably not going to happen, but it would at least be nice to have.
Because the costs are astronomically high for Finland and Sweden than to central european countries that have already cut down their forests before the cutoff date. It's just outsourcing the restoration to countries that didn't destroy their nature fast enough.
That, and also the forest industry. I know that the biodiversity is quite low in the Finnish treefarms, but the the forest industry is necessary if we want to transfer to more ecological biodegradable alternatives to plastics or such.
Additionally, the natural forests in Finland are not and would not be very diverse anyways and really wouldn’t support anything regarding sustainability of human life much more than the vast industrial forests we now have because we are so far upnorth.
Are we trying to do what is best for humans or what is best for the nature as a whole?
People don’t want countries with no forests have a say in what we do with our forests. If I’m not mistaken other EU countries want to use our forests to “lower” their own CO2 emissions to make their statistics look good.
Most of them chopped down their forests to clear land for farmland or industry. Germany de-forested in the 1950ies.
So the people who kept their forests get punished while the ones who eradicated theirs dont have to foot much of the bill.
If the rest of Europe either paid for it, or actually had to put their forests back to pre-industrial levels, then it could be considered fair, but as it stands the people who preserved their forests are the ones who get punished.
Sweden and Finland own vast majority of European forest industry.
2 largest companies are Finnish. 3rd and 4th largest are Swedish. 5th largest is Finnish again.
Finland has scaled their current forestry to 13% protected area. This 20% protected area requirement forces them to shut down factories, or to buy wood from 3rd world countries, or to send factories to 3rd world countries.
The regulation favors those who didn't have much forests already in 1950 or whatever the year was again.
Meanwhile countries like Finland and Sweden never chopped their forests for the most part. The burden should be on the rest of the Europe to catch up.
All European countries chopped their forests. The only difference is that Nordic countries didn't need more agricultural land so they kept planting trees instead of wheat.
It's not like majority of those forests are primal ecosystems.
Indeed a sizeable amount of it is economical forests, in Finland at least. Not much plant density there, just trees.
At the same time when it comes to storing co2 for example, it's much more than what middle europe has I believe.
From what ive read, finnish forests were badly mismanaged in late 1800 early 1900. Goverment back then realized it and drafted laws inspired by germans? to protect forests. Since then most forests cut down had new trees planted after. Our forests grow more these days than they ever did, to find 'natural' forests here you need 150+ years old ones and even those are likely planted originally.
So you have an English source for that?
Not questioning you just interested. I tried Googling but couldn’t find it
Edit: it seems it has long been deleted from the law.
1) Our forests are already maintained and owned by normal citizens.
2) We don't want the EU messing with our private property, the "green gold".
3) We do not want to become the EU:s personal Zoo.
4) The current suggested system is RIDICULOUSLY expensive.
5) Most of our woods are really well maintained, not to mention we HAVE the most wood in the EU. Kinda pisses us off that, thanks to us lovingly upkeeping our forests during the decades, we are now being punished for it.
How about...The rest of EU got their forests to Finnish and Swedish level? No?
Then eff off with your ideas.
It's a bit like the whole "make homes more energy efficient" regulation. It does not really take into account the context of different EU states. They might work on an "average" level across the EU but will be massively easier and harder to implement the further the country is from the average.
You’re on to something here. In NL we have been heating our homes with natural gas for a long time, where in other countries a lot of homes are still heated with fuel oil, which is much more polluting.
Now, to reach the agreed co2 reduction, we have to switch from natural gas to electric heating (for which the tech is not at the point yet where it’s really cost efficient, and our electric infrastructure is not ready for it either.) and those other countries can for a large part go from fuel oil to natural gas, which is a much easier transition.
And on the other hand, some countries get much colder winters than others, so becoming more energy efficient brings other challenges there.
On topic; one of the problems the netherlands have with this nature restoration act is that we have a lot of people on a tiny plot of land. So for almost everything we want to do (build roads, houses, industry, farming etc.) it’s too close to a nature 2000 area to be in accordance with eu rules on nature restoration. Our country could grind to a hold (already has for building houses, highways, and some forms of industry) because of it.
These things are sometimes so different for specific countries that making laws for this should not be centralized in the eu.
Because we’re the ones with the forests, and we already have a bunch of regulations meanwhile other countries have no regulations but still smh gets more paid per ton of wood
Countries like the UK, Spain, Germany, Portugal, etc. cut down their forests back in Jesus' time to build warships. Finland is a big forest with some cities here and there. Let the countries who destroyed their forests "rehabilitate" and plant new ones, call us when you're within a couple orders of magnitudes from the Nordics in square kilometers of forest.
Rest of the Europe should also restore their forests to the levels of pre-industrialization when they didn't have their forests cut down. Then I'm fine with this.
exactly. the situation is comparable to:
>* *Spends all of ones money on casino* *
>
>Hey! You didnt spend your money on casino! Now we must share, since I have none left!
in this analogy the rest of the Europe went to casino, while Sweden and Finland didnt
Basically the legislation is written so that it puts a lot more financial burden on countries with large forested areas (Finland and Sweden), than those that cut down all their forests before 1950 (most of central and western Europe).
Sweden (and probably Finland as well) have chosen a year back in the 19th century for our “year zero” with which to compare forestation figures. This puts a huge burden on us in regard to what to aim to “restore”. Other countries chose a year in the 1990s. Because there was no common requirement for what to compare everything to. As long as this is the case, Sweden should refuse to apply the same regulations. Either we get to use the same year as everyone else, or we won’t do it.
Even more fun was if all countries had to aim to restore their forests to the 1850 level.
Because the EU should stay out of it. It's a domestic issue. Finland and Sweden knows more about forestry than most other EU countries, countries with barely any trees shouldn't tell us how to handle forestry lol.
Our forest are what has kept us from poverty. Both Sweden and Finland are covered with trees. It is a renewable source of heating, construction materials and fuel as well as being the backbone of our economies. In the Nordics we have had the luxury of keeping our forests making them pay for our welfare states and our freedom. Now Germany, who has cut down all their forests to industrialize, will force us to become poorer to pay for the way they generated wealth. I’m generallt pro EU but this is a shit regulation that hits us hard generating low to zero positive effects.
A poorer Europe, which this leads to, will only make it easier for China and Russia to buy or conquer us.
Many finns feel it is not fair. The restoration directive is for some decades ago. Finland was mostly farmland back then while most of Central Europe was already further with industrialization.
Climate change is a common cause but neither Finland nor Sweden can be transformed as parks for the rest of Europe. If cause is common then the costs should be as well
I'm all for restoring more forest areas to their natural stage, but the rest of the EU countries, who have demolished all of their forests into fields and wastelands, could do their part too.
The issue is mostly that it requires a relative improvement from the current level. E.g., instead of requiring "every EU country should have X level of natural environments" or "an X% of their environment should be naturalised".
Instead, it says "you need to improve from your current level by x amount". The problem with this (from the perspective of countries like Finland and Sweden) is that a much higher % of their land is already in a naturalised state. So, in other words, being a model student gets you punished in a way.
Because most countries voting in favour destroyed their forests long before it was even regulated, and now if Finland would need to use some of those forests they'd get fucked by these regulations.
Think of highways for example, most countries already built a ton... but Finland was extremely small in the past, so no need for highways. Now if they'd want to build highways, it'd be met with resistance.
In theory.
People who want to restore wetlands should have all their discussions at the lower Dala river, outside.
See we got rid of the fucking wetlands because mosquitoes spreads diseases. In particular malaria, which we got rid of by removing their wetlands.
Swamps fucking suck to have anywhere close to you. There is a reason we get rid of them
Its basically saying we should remove our ability to be outside in large parts of our country because dickheads in Frankfurt should be fine in drivning SUVs as we have then compensated.
Ive already seen it in practice, with the restoration by removal of damns and built up waterways that have been in place for 500 years.
We are the only ones that have any forests left in Europe. Meanwhile, everyone else have totally fucked up their forests during the last centuries and now they set us to pay for their mistakes.
Both Finland and Sweden are the most experienced with taking care of the forests, it is extremely unfair that the stupid EU punishes us for being the only ones that have any left.
Maybe other EU countries should reach healthy population densities and make sure to cover X% of their land with forest before they start telling others what they should do. Some parts of Europe are fucking disgusting how long you can drive and always see people/houses along the roads. That's the real disease, not the Scandinavian forest industry
We have not yet cut down all our forests so we have plenty of land to protect. Should have lawned them down and turned into autobahns so this would be cheaper
1 practical Example.
If one farmer planted forrest on an area that was not economical suitable for growing barley or wheat. (This has happens in many areas in sweden)
Should he cut down the forest (what EU don’t want to do) and be forced to plant something that is not economical suitable?
2nd problem. Restauration according to what year? Year 1850, 1920 or 1960?
Not the idea of regulation but how it is being worded. The issues come from details of what is involved.
For example, there are large amount rapids used for hydropower, swamps that were used for peat and so on. It would be impossible task with the how the proposition is written now.
Official stance is that regulation does not take into account different member states: [https://valtioneuvosto.fi/en/-/1410903/eu-s-nature-restoration-regulation-supported-by-member-states-regulation-into-force-in-july-august](https://valtioneuvosto.fi/en/-/1410903/eu-s-nature-restoration-regulation-supported-by-member-states-regulation-into-force-in-july-august)
This is as usual a very complex issue put in way too simple terms.
What they are against is not the restoration of nature. They are against the proposed regulation on the restoration of nature. At least that‘s what I think is happening.
As an example: see the USA. Everyone agrees that we need to protect children from accessing adult content. But doing so by having everyone hand over their personal data to adult websites is not that good of a thing.
Cental Europe had huge forests long time ago and they never planted new trees to regrown their forests after cutting them down, just turned it to farmland and because of this they get off very easily with restoration. Northern Europe has been replanting forests centuries and now we get punished heavily costing us billions to turn some forests back swamps (no lack of those). This whole deal makes absolutely no sense for Sweden and Finland and appears utterly unfair.
Edit: also the "GDP benefits from restoration" are admitted to be just random quessed numbers without any reasonable backing. Finland carries 1/6th of the bill and in proportion to GDP way way more than any single other country in EU. Just plain stupid. Looks like EU aims to bankrupt Finland to be the distant nature-reservate. Just no.
Cause it is a stupid idea. This thing is a monster and it is not possible to handle it. You just can't do anything cause you think it is easy and "a good idea".
First you have to put some thought in it how it works and what must be done. This is the "green party problem". It is not enough to "do the right thing". Things must be done right or they will fail.
There is no help in this failing idea. This won't work. I told you so. That is a problem... people hate the "I told you so guys". Especially when they are right.
Its amazing to me that we live in an age where we would rather take a portrait photo of a screen, not rotate it and post it on reddit from that phone than just take a screenshot of what you want to show and post it directly from the computer.
Finally a thread where I can say that EU is not always good for Finland, same for the Euro currency. Finland is better off with more independence and less regulation, and go back to the old currency. It just makes more sense and more beneficial for the country
Normally I will be called a bot for that, discussion on the internet is dead
Lol, you make a good point! As soon as you are a tiny little bit EU-critical in r/Europe the downvoting and name calling begins. I was even called a Russian bot once...
As for the new law... Let the mid-european countries handle their forests and the northern countries theirs. Problem solved.
Is no one else going to complain about OP taking this photo in landscape mode? Like, I thought they taught this rule in elementary schools by this point.
Sweden relies on forestry as a major resource of the country. It's similar to deciding that Norway can't extract its oil. As a Swede, I welcome a healthy biodiversity and thriving nature, but then I request that the EU subsidizes the cost of losing large parts of our forestry sector. That obviously won't happen, so that leaves us in a situation where the EU is trying to push regulation that will cripple several economies for the sake of nature. It's easy to vote for consequences that another party needs to bear.
Both have massive forest industries that would be impacted. They don’t want EU regulation messing with what they feel is a domestic issue.
Not only that but Finland is practically all forest anyway...I guess we could bulldoze Helsinki and plant forest there? But, yes, your original point is also correct - this policy doesn't make much sense here.
Well it's not without merit. I'm not sure about Finland but the way forestry is run in Sweden most forests are closer to farming with pine trees than actual forests. Just massive mono-crops. Biodiversity takes a pretty big hit in these situations.
That, and the method of cutting down a whole forest at a time and then replanting is disastrous for insects and other life vital for the ecosystem.
A monoculture of pine trees doesn't have a lot to offer to an ecosystem in the first place :( They can even harm because they make the ground acidic and hostile to many organisms... It's almost like we're trying to limit diversity 🤷♂️
Diversity is unprofitable in the short term.
If you've ever been in such a forest, you'd have noticed the dead-quite there. No birds, insects or any other wildlife. It's a desert of wood.
I grew up surrounded by such "forests". There is very little wildlife. Some mushrooms manage to grow as well, but desert of wood is a great description. It's ironic: I live in Berlin and there's more species of trees on my street and in the graveyard next to our house (I'd guess 30-40 different types of trees). There are hedgehogs, foxes, squirrels, owls, woodpeckers, nightingales and more rare species that I don't know right in the middle of the city.
Is that actually what they do there?
There and here in Finland also.
Yes. There are much better methods but it's slightly cheaper to just cut down a forest in one go. It's called Kalhygge in Swedish and they can go on forever and ever.
Interesting... I'm on Oregon and we don't do that here anymore. we'll do a section and another section and another section, but it turns out looking like a checkerboard.
Cool! That method is good, but with modern technology, as far as I understand the best method is to cut down every other tree and always leave some coverage.
I went down a YouTube rabbit hole about scything from this Swedish guy. Learned a lot about how the sensitive marshlands are losing biodiversity to Forrest. Even forests that are cut down will regrow saplings every year that dominate marsh plants unless you remove the roots.
Same as cutting down all crops at the same time. No biodiversity
This is exactly why forest statistics don't tell the whole picture. Another issue is the lack of old growth. In my country there is almost no old growth left but there is some trees for farming so "yay we have forests", but not really...
it's exactly the same in Finland. our biodiversity is shit and there are very little old untouched forests, despite having a massive amount of trees. Also drying up all the swamps was a stupid move in hindsight. The Finnish / Nordic special relation with nature is a joke.
Think about all the mosquitoes that didn’t hatch because of the dried swamp.
There’s only 21 trillion mosquitoes hatching anymore every year, in Northern Ostrobotnia alone
For todays trivia, draining the swamps (before it was cool) is actually attributed as one of the reasons we got rid of malaria in Sweden.
> malaria in Sweden. Isn't Sweden (as is most Europe) too cold for the malaria parasite to survive? Do you have any materials/documents for historical malaria cases there?
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33933085/
Yes you can find lots but you'll have to run through a translator. Here's for instance a reference by the Swedish health agency https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/smittskydd-beredskap/smittsamma-sjukdomar/malaria/ and one from Wikipedia https://sv.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malariamyggor You could dig more if you search for 'malaria sverige.
Since that appears to be a global warming denialist website I would say the credibility of the source is very low indeed.
Good catch, I'll remove it.
Malaria was also an issue before the Germans straightened the Rhine or got rid of the swamps around Berlin. It was not uncommon in Europe.
There were malaria in Finland still in the early 1900s. In the whole country, including north
Drain the swamps!
Am I hearing you calling in the Dutch?
Less than 2% is in natural state. Rest is planted forest, mostly pine and spruce. Most Finns have never been to natural forest and don't even know about it.
Might as well. A natural forest is full of undergrowth and isn't very navigable.
Not always, depends on soil etc.
Modern European forestry is still very low intensity farming. Far less impacts than most types of land use and biodiversity is always going to be very low in regions like Finland due to the northernness
Note: the above comment is pure bullshit. Finland has more strictly protected forest than the entire rest of EU put together.
Finland also has more forest ditches than the rest of the world combined.
Yeah 13% of our forests are protected, which like you said, is more than the rest of EU combined. The absolute vast majority of our woods are tree plantations with shit biodiversity. Comparing us to southerners wont change the reality, even if it makes you feel good.
True or false, probably not exactly a high bar to clear.
Spruce and pine will outcompete all other trees in the latitudes you find in the top 3/4 of Sweden and most of Finland. Only the coasts and the mountains are any different. This particular vote was about restoring wetlands in an attempt to slow down CO2 emissions from decaying peat. Admirable but the whole reasoning behind it is pretty flawed. The CO2 emissions reduction is very small and there's a reason why the wetlands were dyked to begin with
Depends. Some forests in the more hidden areas are grid forest. Others are refrown naturally by leaving several så tall trees standing lonesome in naked fields to regrow them.
> most forests are closer to farming with pine trees than actual forests. Just massive mono-crops. Naturally grown old forests are pretty much massive mono-crops too dominated by one single climax species favouring the conditions (temps, soil type, dampness etc). If at these latitudes you leave a large forest untouched by humans for centuries it will become an old forest and when it reaches its climax phase it will be dominated by a single tree species with very little or no other species. The dominant species outcompetes all other species, and in such forests other species cannot grow big and may only grow in niches such as temporarily in a hole left by a fallen dominant tree, or in niches left by a forest fire (though even a fire won't kill off the dominant trees). In most of Finland and Sweden those dominant climax species are either spruce or pine, both conifers, and in parts of Southern Sweden also beech a deciduous species. If Finland and Sweden were left alone without any human touch in few centuries they would be covered by old climax forests of either pines or spruces (or beeches in Southern Scania). You wouldn't have for example large forests of birch - only in niches. Monoculture is the natural state with one very dominant species and other species growing in niches where ever they can. However, the big difference with a natural old forest and a planted forest is the age and state of trees. Even if natural old forest is monoculture it has trees of different ages, and dead trees in different stages of decomposition. A planted forest does not typically have those, and that limits the biodiversity of animals, insects, plants, fungi etc that can live in such planted forest. So the biodiversity is not that much about tree species but about other species that can live and thrive in a forest. And generally the millenia of human touch has been good for biodiversity: without humans large areas of Europe would be covered by monocultures of beech, pine or spruce. That was the natural state millenia ago. For example in parts of Finland we can still see the effects of centuries of hack&slash agriculture which gave a niche for birch and other deciduous species to thrive. Which rises a question of what do we mean by nature restoration? Do we mean the actual natural state? Or the state nature used to be 2000 years ago? Or a century ago? Human touch has been present for millenia now so to which state are we going to restore?
Please tell me the source of your knowledge, as I first time hear that old forests are mono-crops. Of course some trees will dominate others, but mono-crops are mostly created by humans. Like you said, pine trees for forest industry. Also I agree that the point of old forests is not really the trees, it is all the other things, that grows under them, or on the dead trees.
He's saying that boreal forests tend to be monoculture because at those latitudes spruce is the one that outcompetes everything. They also prevent any other species of new growth trees due to how their fallen needles acidify the soil. There's a reason for why old growth forests are mainly spruce over here.
When Georgia (the state, not the country) was first colonized, there were very large forests that basically nothing but pine. In the western US, there are immense stretches of forest that are made up almost entirely of [Ponderosa Pine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponderosa_pine_forest). Siberia has truly massive stretches of [forest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Siberian_taiga) that are made up almost completely of larch. > This vast ecoregion is located in the heart of Siberia, stretching over 20° of latitude and 50° of longitude[1] (52° to 72° N, and 80° to 130° E). ... > Vegetation consists mainly of vast, dense forests of Dahurian larch (Larix gmelinii), with Siberian larch (Larix sibirica) and hybrids between the Dahurian and Siberian larches (Larix x czekanowskii) occurring as one moves to the west Canada has [massive forests](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boreal_forest_of_Canada) that are overwhelmingly spruce. > The boreal region in Canada covers almost 60% of the country's land area.[2] The Canadian boreal region spans the landscape from the most easterly part of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador to the border between the far northern Yukon and Alaska. The area is dominated by coniferous forests, particularly spruce, interspersed with vast wetlands, mostly bogs and fens That's just kindof how boreal forests work.
Yup. Generally speaking here in Finland we have broadleaf forests only on the southern coast and then mixed forests inland but majority is always spruce (in wetter areas) or scots pine (in more arid and sandy soil areas).
And most of those deciduous forests in the south are mostly due to human touch because only in rare circumstances can for example birch grow into a forest without getting outcompeted by spruce. Some of those are remnants of the old hack&slash agriculture that was practiced for centuries.
I'm no expert, but around Norway there's plenty of old forests. Most of them is almost exclusively pine or spruce. Spruce in areas with rich soil, pine in areas with sandy soil. Birch and a few other trees grow here and there, but rarely larger than a bush.
> Please tell me the source of your knowledge, as I first time hear that old forests are mono-crops. Of course some trees will dominate others, but mono-crops are mostly created by humans. You're wrong. The natural state of forests in most of Europe is to be monocultures of single dominant tree species with niches for other tree species. We still have some forests remaining untouched by humans since the de-glaciation in Europe. And guess what, they are monocultures dominated by beech! You want a source? For example wikipedia: "The **primeval beech forests of the Carpathians are also an example of a singular, complete, and comprehensive forest dominated by a single tree species - the beech tree**. Forest dynamics here were allowed to proceed **without interruption or interference since the last ice age**. Nowadays, they are amongst the last pure beech forests in Europe to document the undisturbed postglacial repopulation of the species, which also includes the unbroken existence of typical animals and plants." Here's the UNESCO world heritage site: "World Heritage Beech Forests **Once they grew everywhere**, but today beech forests belong to the most endangered habitats. **Beech forests are Europe’s natural wilderness**. The World Heritage Site comprises the few remaining primeval beech forests and centuries-old European beech forest areas unaltered by humans. The European Beech is endemic to Europe. Two things make it particularly special: **It is extremely assertive and exceptionally adaptable.**" After de-glaciation most of Europe was covered with monoculture beech forests. The only reason we have for example forests of big, old oaks instead of monocultures of beeches is human touch. For millenia humans have preferred oak for building material and used beech as firewood. And you cannot have a forest of oaks without humans tending to it and removing the beeches which would eventually outcompete the oaks in long term leaving only niches for oaks. Have you ever been in an old natural beech forest? Very little else grows there because the big beeches shadow the ground and it's too dark for most plants. Here's a picture of an old beech forest floor: https://mediaim.expedia.com/destination/2/7b49a33ee366e06e58eaa956f74bf8f2.jpg That is not to say that a beech forest would not have biodiversity, it does but not in the sense of tree species but in the sense that it provides habitats for many species of animals, insects, fungi etc to live and thrive. And in most of Finland and Sweden the natural dominant species would be conifers pine or spruce (and beech in Southern Scania).
I don't think most people were talking about tree biodiversity in the first place, but things like animals and insects, and other non-tree plants. There barely any old forests in Finland, and places like swamps and their biodiversity are also suffering.
This is very true as I already mentioned in my first comment. An old forest, even if it's monoculture of one dominant species, has more biodiversity than a planted tree farm. That is because an old natural forest has more trees of different ages and dead trees at different stages of decomposition.
Just look at a picture of the taiga in Siberia
Would be interested in you source(s) too, even though I feel like you're right. We see this in Germany too: oldest are natural beech forests, then for industry fir & spruce monocultures were planted, all roughly same age, height as you described. Ideally, we would need to leave as much land untouched as we can from now on. This also intertwines with reducing wood consumption and increasing recycling/upcycling.
I wrote another comment with some basic sources here: https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1dikesx/why_are_finnland_and_sweden_against_the/l95alhn/ >Ideally, we would need to leave as much land untouched as we can from now on. I have to disagree. In most of Europe the natural state is monocultures of beech, spruce or pine. Humans have impacted and tented forests for millenia in Europe. That's why Europe is not covered by forests of only beech, spruce or pine. If in Europe we want diverse forests of many tree species thriving in them it can only happen with humans tending to those forests.
That's the situation -everywhere-. Unkept forests tend to rot.
It's not about planting forests. It's about making more land area to it's natural state, meaning blocking ditches, making rivers and streams back to their original state and path, and making old dried bogs to bogs again.
I think main sentiment here is (without actually reading that regulation, or saying it is 100% true necessarily, just that what moods people have about this): "Our nature has already mostly been left lot closer to it's natural state, even if it is not untouched, so why are we required to restore it same amount more towards untouched, if rest of Europe will as result only barely get to level where we are, and we will be pushed to remain as far ahead most countries, and we are bit worried about how if routine forms of kind of 'absolute increases in this field, with no consideration to start level' then next or one after that might actually push us to need to try to complete some unobtainable goal, while others still have pretty easy time implementing theirs, since they have so much so absolutely far from original state areas." Thing is that most of Europe apparently used to be forest, but most of countries ended up completely changing their land type, while nordic countries are lot closer to that "still covered with forest". So there is bit of sentiment with "well how about we start talking major actions here, after for example France and Germany have 60% of their total area covered with forest, so they are just 10% units behind our current 70%". (Based on Wikipedia Germany has about 32% coverage and France (when counting its area in Europe only) 31% coverage, so to gain 60% they would need to double amount of forest in their area, also funnily enough kind of actually kind of inverse % to Finland). But yeah all countries could use at least some improving, I want to stress that I CAN NOT comment on how reasonable or unreasonable that regulation is, since I have to admit I have not checked what it covers and in what way and how much it is "we all just do this same thing, EZ", or "If we precision do these things in this kind of regions and so..". Ultimately I guess there is also little bit of bit strangeish historical bitterness over "well they burned their forests and heavily modified their lands to get industrial growth and benefit, and now they want us to equally lift them up form there". Or so. And yeah I also remember some cases where Finnish environmental authorities have been implementing earlier nature restoration regulations, and people being "my grandfather who I spent my childhood with cleared this small field, that I now have, with his bare hands with minimal tools, from being just full of rocks, to grow vegetables for his family to survive... now I got told that I need to turn it into rocky swamp again.. Instead of having it as feature and reminder it has my whole life been" or so situations, that while yeah we strictly do not need that field anymore, and sure that part could also be same swampy environment that part of surrounding areas are too, they might also in some cases (fortunately not that often) personal small tragedies of "but our family has had this for last 100 years.. Now do I need to start digging and carrying those stones back, stones that my grandfather took so massive effort to carry away from there". But yeah things need to be done, and one of only potential ways they get done unfortunately usually is to show example, thing that sometimes feels that mostly all of EU is doing in several things.. like "we do not contribute to massive part of this problem, actually rather insignificant part, and we could do it with lighter approach, but heck to try to get other parts of world to improve, or to softly force them in nearby future, we need to now make this change that we apply to ourselves, so that we can then pressure others better, and use economical influence (causing there to be ready industry for things needed for this change, so others can get it easier and cheaper to follow, and so that industry might flip "why bother doing things with 2 sets of standards, if we can just do it way that is ok to EU, since others also accept it" that will result in others adapting it no matter if they decide or not). I mean unfortunately since it is kind of delayed effect in some cases to places where it would be more critical and more important to implement as fast as possible. But hey masses of people and social structures and so work as they work, and our methods and tools to working with them are what they happen to be at moment.
Oh yeah also it might be worth noting: There is this mentality that is tied to certain social constructs with Finnish culture, where mostly Eu regulations hit the spot where they are handled as "not just law, but higher level commandment that needs to be rapidly implemented to full letter and intent of it, overriding local matters/decisions/things if they risk conflicting", so no EU regulation is taken as kind of "well they are suggesting, and this is goal we should be working towards, or we will attempt to reach this goal", but instead as "This WILL BE DONE, and it will be done completely and fully and at rate where we will be sure it is done before required date". That has actually been building some sentiment where people have been getting impression and thinking that "well EU set this regulation mostly aimed to some other region of EU, and area it was set for is handling it as 'well neat recommendation we can maybe consider and follow when it is convenient to us' while we enforced it strictly and modified our way of living, even if it was not exactly that important if we do it, but since it was decided, we it has to be done. So did this only end up inconveniencing our lives and costing our money, while people that were misbehaving in way that this needed to be decided are still just mostly or partially ignoring this issue and maintaining problem behaviour". That might rise from some random and rare cases, and might be completely or partially incorrect, but is still something that affects social interactions on individual and national scale. Regardless thing is that Finland tends to see these as "if it is decided, at least that much HAS TO HAPPEN in way that it has to be reached AT LATEST AT DATE DESIGNATED". So when weighting reaction it is seen as "Is this something IN THIS EXACT form, that we want to be absolute limits that will not be bent or crossed potentially ever again, ((possibly also considering:) along with it's likely followup decisions that will likely go through)". Of course these are not 100% "This is how it is", but more about mentality in what these things are easily instinctively seen as and talked as. Or what people at least think they will be.
Forest restoration doesn't just mean planting new trees. It means adding more dead trees, more trees of different ages, more diversity in the tree species composition and more burnt wood for example. All ecologically important things lacking in the tree fields of Finland.
Fortunately at least baby steps in some things are being made towards this. (Might not be straight up important or noticeable large, but getting people to come to think of those things on instinctive level as something that just should be, instead of exotic things, is already important thing). Recently saw that city set up one tree to be "coarse woody debris" in nearby small woods. With visibility to closeby road and walking path, with actual sizeable sign on it's side about matter, and how it is required as part of improving biodiversity. Was neat, since there it will actually be visible, people will out of curiosity read the sign, then whenever they see that tree they will remember why and what it is. --> They get trained to more readily accept that as thing that needs to be and exists. --> it will slowly work it's way to making more acceptance and better adoption of biodiversity improving things to populaition.
A lot of restorations are currently being done, especially with swamp restorations, since swamps are significant ecological hotspots for diversity in Finland and also historically heavily abused for agriculture and peat production.
To be fair there isn't much biodiversity left in Finnish forests, there aren't many old growths left and most of the forests are just fields of trees. I know Finland has the largest areas of protected forests in Europe, but it also has the largest tree fields
The restoration is not just about forests, but swamps and water areas also.
Most of our forests are commercial meaning they get cut down often for profit, this new ruling would mean we have to leave more forest untouched which would decrease profits but keep our nature healthier
In that case vote for it would have not impacted their countries much, but would allow for the nature in de rest of Europe to be somewhat restored....
This. The reason why some people here are so opposed to the climate and nature regulations is because they feel that the big countries like Germany and France want to turn Finland into some bog reservate with no agriculture or forest industry while they keep their coal plants and car industry.
I imagine its pretty similar in Finland. In Sweden we take pretty good care of the forest and almost everyone having forest have "Important eco system" parts of forest that's forbidden to cut. Now EU wants to dictate how we take care of our forest.
Estimated cost of 700 million per year is also a big concern.
and not just inside their countries :))) ikea likes the wood from other countries also
The national treasure of Finland, the forests, which the politicians want to cut down
First result on Google copying your title into the search bar: *Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden voted against the law, while Belgium abstained. They criticised the cost of the proposal and said it would place too many administrative burdens on them.*
And Belgium abstained because Flanders (mostly right/far right) is against the new law while Wallonia and Brussels (left/moderate right) are in favour.
You answered my question. Saw the only abstained voted and my first thought was: both communities did not agree on the same stance? So voting in EU is not a federal prerogative but lies with needed consent of the other (6?) government?
Things like that are decided in cooperation between the Federal minister responsible for the environment and the three regional ministers who are also responsible for the environment in their respective regions . So there are “only” four ministers responsible here. Which, I believe, is the maximum. There isn’t any case with five or six responsible ministers.
Is the third local minister then one in Brussels ?
It depends on the topic. Belgium is divided twice: in regions and in communities. Regions are based on the territory and handle authorities like streets, nature, buildings... Communities are based on the people and their language handle authorities like health care, education, culture... There are three regions: Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia. There are three communities: Dutch, French and German. Brussels is served by both the French and Dutch speaking communities. For territorial authorities in the German-speaking towns in East-Belgium the Walloon government is responsible Each region and each community would have their own parliament and government. But the Dutch community and Flanders region decided to merge governments. This results in 5 governments: Flemish government, French-speaking community government, Walloon government, Brussels government and German-speaking community government. Combined with the federal government as well, we have 6 governments in total. Anyway, long story short. In this case, with an EU law about nature, the region governments need to agree: Flemish, Brussels and Wallonia governments. If it was a law about for example education, it would have been the community governments: Flemish, French-speaking community and German-speaking governments.
I highly doubt MR or LE are in favour of it.
[(from 2023) All French-speaking MEPs voted in favor of the legislative proposal on nature restoration. Including Benoît Lutgen (Les Engagés), who deviated from the hard line taken by his group, the European People's Party. On the Dutch-speaking side, the CD&V, the liberal Vautmans and the Vlaams Belang voted against.](https://www.lalibre.be/international/europe/2023/07/12/comment-ont-vote-les-belges-sur-la-loi-sur-la-restauration-de-la-nature-PWQEID2A2RB4XGZW34U3OXDJZE/?outputType=amp)
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This is often true for laws that sound like common sense: it's expensive and a lot of work to implement. You'll find someone vote against anything that "makes sense" for many reasons, including "peace in Gaza", "no more cigarettes" and "car free cities".
Man lately Hungary is getting me fucking triggered. That fat f*cker Orban will vote against anything just for the sake of it… Why aren’t we kicking him out? He’s just profiting from EU while kneeling in front of Putin and his henchmen.
Tbh. in this case he is arguably correct. Hungary has pretty decent forests. International law level regulations feel like a tad bit of an overreach. To put it mildly people eouldnt eelcome german levels of bureucracy - requiring license to cut down a tree on their property, leafing to multiple forest owners having to bamd together to afford cutting trees by qualified personnel.
wed love to have him kicked out
I feel bad for Hungarians but while he’s getting his ass eaten by Putin he shouldn’t be having a voice in there.
everything i could say has been said a billion times: that 3 million people are keeping him in power, that peopel are hopeless to vote, that there has historically been no better alternative, et cetera if a hungarian speaks english, theyre in a minority, if theyre also on reddit, thats even rarer, u will only find anti orbán people on reddit or among the younger populace, all that might cast a distorted image to foreigners
What about Italy, Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, Poland who also voted against?
That they voted against it still doesn’t exclude that Hungary automatically votes against any proposal every single time.
No need to be extreme here. Do they veto a lot of things? Sure. Is it every single time? Not even half, thats just not in the news cos it’s not interesting.
Someone said that the cost of this regulation would be 40x more expensive for Finland than for Germany (adjusted per capita). Finland is one of the world's most forested areas, so strict nature restoration rules would have huge costs. I'm no expert, so I can't say how reliable these numbers are.
This, and to be fair current calculations expect it to be 60 to 80 times more expensive than Germany, not just 40.
If this is an EU-wide regulation, why isn't the EU paying for it? Or at least subsidising to make it fairer?
it mainly concerns agriculture and agriculture is already massively subsidised by the eu
At least in Finland's context it's almost entirely about forestry (edit: and wetlands). Finland is 75% forest and 8% farmland.
Actually onlu about 10% of the costs cover forestry, most of the costs are from wetlands for example swamps. Out of Finlands whole area a third is covered by swamps and of which about a half is drained.
I imagine that if that would be the system, then more members would have been against this. But if you are a country that is substantially less impacted financially with this decision? "Awesome, where can I sign!?"
EU can't pay for shit. EU doesn't make any money. In the end it's all still tax payers money.
I'm all for preserving nature and creating healthy diverse forests, but this whole law sure sounded like countries who've destroyed their own forests 100 years ago now want to preach to countries who still have forests, given that in Sweden and Finland the forests nowadays are pretty much fields of trees, not real, natural forests.
Yeah thats right. We have other countries forests to cause they have chopped them away. So we dont want pay for that.
Why would someone take a photo of a screen and rotate it 90°?
Sometimes the EXIF orientation data gets lost
The eu should mandate the restoration of exif data.
Username checks out
Fun fact: Austria is sueing their minister for this vote. She voted for it despite having told not to.
Not Austria, but our chancellor and/or his party (övp). Btw there were a recent opinion poll and 82% of Austrians are in favor of this regulation
>82% of Austrians are in favor of this regulation because let's be honest, it sounds good but nobody knows yet what the implications will mean in reality. We will see in the coming years.
Well, you definitely got a point there. I was still surprised by the high approvel to this regulation
Me too. Not that I am against it - I understand the basics of it, but understanding every single detail requires a lot of expert knowledge imo and I heavily doubt more than a few % of the 82 actually do. I can't say with confidence that I can support it tbh, I can just hope it's worth it.
But they don’t have the right to told her what to vote anyway so the sue has no chance to succeed and is a pr stunt more or less (which has already backfired)
Yeah it is mostly a pr stunt for the upcoming elections.
It sadly is not that easy and law experts of all colors have very different opinions on whether it was lawful or not. And there are heavy arguments to both sides, for example the principle of unity that formally still exists and is against the vote, even though Vienna and Carinthia have verbally expressed their acknowledgement to a positive vote, it might not have any effect on the formal agreement. It's gonna be a fun couple years with this.
The chances are close to zero that there will be any effect as it’s clearly not a clear violation of law.
If it were that clear law experts wouldn't be so split in their opinion, but yeah, random redditor #98762 is probably right and it's gonna be dismissed any second now. Edit: [here](https://www.derstandard.at/story/3000000224823/schlacht-der-gutachter-hat-gewessler-das-recht-gebrochen-um-schmetterlinge-zu-schuetzen?ref=article) is an article in German that explains pretty well the different positions and why at least partially the matter will take some serious turns on all levels of judication.
Idk what the law is in Austria, but at least in Denmark if a minister went rogue like that they would risk impeachment and a prison sentence.
To add some data to what others have already said. If we take population density (I used the numbers from [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_and_population_of_European_countries)) and the percentage of area that is forest (numbers from [Eurostat](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Forests,_forestry_and_logging)) do you get that the table below; in which Finland are 24 persons per km2 of forest and in Sweden there are 38. Third place is Latvia on 53 followed closely by Estonia on 54, and then a giant gap down to fifth place Lithuania on 124. France later comes in on 378 and Germany even later on 728. So the simple reason that Finland and Sweden voted no is that the costs per person will be by far the highest for them. || || |**Country**|**People by km2 of forest**| |Finland|24| |Sweden|38| |Latvia|53| |Estonia|54| |Lithuania|124| |Bulgaria|174| |Slovenia|181| |Croatia|209| |Austria|233| |Spain|243| |Greece|260| |Romania|286| |Slovakia|295| |Portugal|306| |France|378| |Czechia|391| |Poland|437| |Hungary|495| |Cyprus|521| |Ireland|600| |Italy|609| |Germany|728| |Luxembourg|744| |Denmark |920| |Belgium|1'741| |Netherlands|4'240| |Malta|170'000|
Your table is broken: Country|People by km2 of forest :--|--: Finland|24 Sweden|38 Latvia|53 Estonia|54 Lithuania|124 Bulgaria|174 Slovenia|181 Croatia|209 Austria|233 Spain|243 Greece|260 Romania|286 Slovakia|295 Portugal|306 France|378 Czechia|391 Poland|437 Hungary|495 Cyprus|521 Ireland|600 Italy|609 Germany|728 Luxembourg|744 Denmark |920 Belgium|1'741 Netherlands|4'240 Malta|170'000 I deleted the | |around each row|, added a new line to each row, deleted the first line and added the alignment ":--|--:" after the first row.
Thank you for making a table that worked! No idea why my broke
even in tree coverage were in the lower end of the spectrum
Both are large countries with relatively low population, so there's a vast amount of land to be restored with small amount of people to pay for that restoration.
Also, most of the deforestation in Germany happened prior to 1950, the cut off date, during the industrial revolution, which is not the case with other countries which started industrialization after WWII. So Germany has a big economy and huge population, with relatively few forest to restore, while Finnland has a low population and smaller economy with a much larger area to reforest, plus the administration. It's just not fair. It's the same kind of inequality we have in carbon reductions: sure, England and China (Africa, India, etc) both have to reduce their carbon footprints, but England already profited from kickstarting the industrial revolution and buring all the coal they had (and those carbon emissions are still in the athmosphere), and with the money they earnt, they ruled the world, now everyone telling China (Africa, India, etc..) to stop burning coal, because climate change. It does not work like that, without some kind of fairness principle, we won't meet carbon reduction targets, because China (Africa, India, etc..) will want to reach the same level of developpement the global North have achieved already.
The cut-off date of 1950 isn't present in the last version of the regulation. You are talking about an earlier draft. It was removed because Finland wanted it to be removed. After it was removed, Finland still voted no.
So if there is no cutoff then the whole thing is moot? we could restore our swamps and forest to how they were yesterday and be finished today.
We are basically the size of Germany with a population of new york city. Most of Finland is either forest, lakes or bogs. For crying out loud some of our towns look like forests with some houses in them. To put it mildly this has made some of us to put it mildly outraged
It's more about the loss of export income. It's not the money spent that is the problem, it's the money not gained.
Naturally that too, but it's undisputed that this new regulation disproportionately hits countries that are large in area but small in population.
> It's not the money spent that is the problem It's also a problem. It's nearly billion a year of extra costs when we barely can even afford to maintain our healthcare.
Naturally, it’s both.
Mostly I think the reasons are about the self governance issue and that this affects the nordic countries disproportionately. For example in the initial calculations of the cost of this desision would put Finland's costs as the third largest in the whole of EU. The costs directed to Finland in those estimates were a bit under 13 % of the whole package to a nation that has 1,8 % of EU GDP. TL;DR: Disporpotionate costs and self determination
Sadly, this is the kind of things those opposing the EU in Norway has been talking about. You end up with a bunch of people down in Europe sitting and telling other people what they should do. And when that happens, you find out they are in a majority.
I am sure the People in the less population-dense parts of Norway think the same way about politics being done in Oslo
The difference is the Norwegian government is responsible for finances across Norway so when the cost overwhelms local business the government resolves that. The same is not true across the EU because it's not a fiscal union.
I'm not familiar enough with the EU, but if there isn't, then there should be some kind of limit what you can force a nation to spend thanks to a ruling. Personally I'm all for the EU, as long as it's fair and equal.
I think it would be better if this nature restoration law just included EU funding like the CAP. Fiscal union is kinda needed anyway if you're going to have a single currency.
Nice dream, unfortunately it’s never fair and equal to EVERYONE Same reason why Sweden refuses the euro, and Norway doesn't give a damn about joining The big fish benefit the most, namely Germany and France
I don't mean it has to be 1:1 equal, but you shouldn't be able to ask a country to pay multiple times more. I get that it's probably not going to happen, but it would at least be nice to have.
They do, even if they in practice actually have the majority of the parlament, which is kind of amusing (at best.)
Because the costs are astronomically high for Finland and Sweden than to central european countries that have already cut down their forests before the cutoff date. It's just outsourcing the restoration to countries that didn't destroy their nature fast enough. That, and also the forest industry. I know that the biodiversity is quite low in the Finnish treefarms, but the the forest industry is necessary if we want to transfer to more ecological biodegradable alternatives to plastics or such.
Additionally, the natural forests in Finland are not and would not be very diverse anyways and really wouldn’t support anything regarding sustainability of human life much more than the vast industrial forests we now have because we are so far upnorth. Are we trying to do what is best for humans or what is best for the nature as a whole?
People don’t want countries with no forests have a say in what we do with our forests. If I’m not mistaken other EU countries want to use our forests to “lower” their own CO2 emissions to make their statistics look good.
Most of them chopped down their forests to clear land for farmland or industry. Germany de-forested in the 1950ies. So the people who kept their forests get punished while the ones who eradicated theirs dont have to foot much of the bill. If the rest of Europe either paid for it, or actually had to put their forests back to pre-industrial levels, then it could be considered fair, but as it stands the people who preserved their forests are the ones who get punished.
Sweden and Finland own vast majority of European forest industry. 2 largest companies are Finnish. 3rd and 4th largest are Swedish. 5th largest is Finnish again. Finland has scaled their current forestry to 13% protected area. This 20% protected area requirement forces them to shut down factories, or to buy wood from 3rd world countries, or to send factories to 3rd world countries.
Although Stora Enso has its headquarters in Helsinki it’s still a Finish & Swedish company. STORA has a 1000 year history in Sweden.
The regulation favors those who didn't have much forests already in 1950 or whatever the year was again. Meanwhile countries like Finland and Sweden never chopped their forests for the most part. The burden should be on the rest of the Europe to catch up.
The cut-off year of 1950 isn't present in the final version of the regulation. It was removed because Finland wanted it to be removed.
All European countries chopped their forests. The only difference is that Nordic countries didn't need more agricultural land so they kept planting trees instead of wheat. It's not like majority of those forests are primal ecosystems.
Indeed a sizeable amount of it is economical forests, in Finland at least. Not much plant density there, just trees. At the same time when it comes to storing co2 for example, it's much more than what middle europe has I believe.
Not now, now, but the issues is that the comparison is 1950. They mostly were primal ecosystems back then.
From what ive read, finnish forests were badly mismanaged in late 1800 early 1900. Goverment back then realized it and drafted laws inspired by germans? to protect forests. Since then most forests cut down had new trees planted after. Our forests grow more these days than they ever did, to find 'natural' forests here you need 150+ years old ones and even those are likely planted originally.
So you have an English source for that? Not questioning you just interested. I tried Googling but couldn’t find it Edit: it seems it has long been deleted from the law.
Cuz its at minimum a 500 million euro expense for Finland. And with 5 million people, thats a lot.
That is 500 million every year with a estimated cost of 13-19 billion by the year 2050
The disproportional cost of this for Finland is completely unfair.
1) Our forests are already maintained and owned by normal citizens. 2) We don't want the EU messing with our private property, the "green gold". 3) We do not want to become the EU:s personal Zoo. 4) The current suggested system is RIDICULOUSLY expensive. 5) Most of our woods are really well maintained, not to mention we HAVE the most wood in the EU. Kinda pisses us off that, thanks to us lovingly upkeeping our forests during the decades, we are now being punished for it. How about...The rest of EU got their forests to Finnish and Swedish level? No? Then eff off with your ideas.
It's a bit like the whole "make homes more energy efficient" regulation. It does not really take into account the context of different EU states. They might work on an "average" level across the EU but will be massively easier and harder to implement the further the country is from the average.
You’re on to something here. In NL we have been heating our homes with natural gas for a long time, where in other countries a lot of homes are still heated with fuel oil, which is much more polluting. Now, to reach the agreed co2 reduction, we have to switch from natural gas to electric heating (for which the tech is not at the point yet where it’s really cost efficient, and our electric infrastructure is not ready for it either.) and those other countries can for a large part go from fuel oil to natural gas, which is a much easier transition. And on the other hand, some countries get much colder winters than others, so becoming more energy efficient brings other challenges there. On topic; one of the problems the netherlands have with this nature restoration act is that we have a lot of people on a tiny plot of land. So for almost everything we want to do (build roads, houses, industry, farming etc.) it’s too close to a nature 2000 area to be in accordance with eu rules on nature restoration. Our country could grind to a hold (already has for building houses, highways, and some forms of industry) because of it. These things are sometimes so different for specific countries that making laws for this should not be centralized in the eu.
Because we’re the ones with the forests, and we already have a bunch of regulations meanwhile other countries have no regulations but still smh gets more paid per ton of wood
Countries like the UK, Spain, Germany, Portugal, etc. cut down their forests back in Jesus' time to build warships. Finland is a big forest with some cities here and there. Let the countries who destroyed their forests "rehabilitate" and plant new ones, call us when you're within a couple orders of magnitudes from the Nordics in square kilometers of forest.
Rest of the Europe should also restore their forests to the levels of pre-industrialization when they didn't have their forests cut down. Then I'm fine with this.
exactly. the situation is comparable to: >* *Spends all of ones money on casino* * > >Hey! You didnt spend your money on casino! Now we must share, since I have none left! in this analogy the rest of the Europe went to casino, while Sweden and Finland didnt
Basically the legislation is written so that it puts a lot more financial burden on countries with large forested areas (Finland and Sweden), than those that cut down all their forests before 1950 (most of central and western Europe).
1950 was removed from the law a while ago, it’s not in the law
its easy for german and french politicians to demand we preserve our forests, we ARE THE ONES WITH THE FORESTs while they have bulldozed theirs
Sweden (and probably Finland as well) have chosen a year back in the 19th century for our “year zero” with which to compare forestation figures. This puts a huge burden on us in regard to what to aim to “restore”. Other countries chose a year in the 1990s. Because there was no common requirement for what to compare everything to. As long as this is the case, Sweden should refuse to apply the same regulations. Either we get to use the same year as everyone else, or we won’t do it. Even more fun was if all countries had to aim to restore their forests to the 1850 level.
Quite oversimplified, the policy is seen as ill-fitting to current local needs in the Nordics.
Because the EU should stay out of it. It's a domestic issue. Finland and Sweden knows more about forestry than most other EU countries, countries with barely any trees shouldn't tell us how to handle forestry lol.
Our forest are what has kept us from poverty. Both Sweden and Finland are covered with trees. It is a renewable source of heating, construction materials and fuel as well as being the backbone of our economies. In the Nordics we have had the luxury of keeping our forests making them pay for our welfare states and our freedom. Now Germany, who has cut down all their forests to industrialize, will force us to become poorer to pay for the way they generated wealth. I’m generallt pro EU but this is a shit regulation that hits us hard generating low to zero positive effects. A poorer Europe, which this leads to, will only make it easier for China and Russia to buy or conquer us.
Many finns feel it is not fair. The restoration directive is for some decades ago. Finland was mostly farmland back then while most of Central Europe was already further with industrialization. Climate change is a common cause but neither Finland nor Sweden can be transformed as parks for the rest of Europe. If cause is common then the costs should be as well
I'm all for restoring more forest areas to their natural stage, but the rest of the EU countries, who have demolished all of their forests into fields and wastelands, could do their part too.
The issue is mostly that it requires a relative improvement from the current level. E.g., instead of requiring "every EU country should have X level of natural environments" or "an X% of their environment should be naturalised". Instead, it says "you need to improve from your current level by x amount". The problem with this (from the perspective of countries like Finland and Sweden) is that a much higher % of their land is already in a naturalised state. So, in other words, being a model student gets you punished in a way.
This is a disaster, laws like this will be the end of EU. Its horrible for Finland and Sweden.
Because most countries voting in favour destroyed their forests long before it was even regulated, and now if Finland would need to use some of those forests they'd get fucked by these regulations. Think of highways for example, most countries already built a ton... but Finland was extremely small in the past, so no need for highways. Now if they'd want to build highways, it'd be met with resistance. In theory.
People who want to restore wetlands should have all their discussions at the lower Dala river, outside. See we got rid of the fucking wetlands because mosquitoes spreads diseases. In particular malaria, which we got rid of by removing their wetlands. Swamps fucking suck to have anywhere close to you. There is a reason we get rid of them Its basically saying we should remove our ability to be outside in large parts of our country because dickheads in Frankfurt should be fine in drivning SUVs as we have then compensated. Ive already seen it in practice, with the restoration by removal of damns and built up waterways that have been in place for 500 years.
One reason is low population density. A lot of area per capita. A lot of the area is also forests.
We are the only ones that have any forests left in Europe. Meanwhile, everyone else have totally fucked up their forests during the last centuries and now they set us to pay for their mistakes. Both Finland and Sweden are the most experienced with taking care of the forests, it is extremely unfair that the stupid EU punishes us for being the only ones that have any left.
Maybe other EU countries should reach healthy population densities and make sure to cover X% of their land with forest before they start telling others what they should do. Some parts of Europe are fucking disgusting how long you can drive and always see people/houses along the roads. That's the real disease, not the Scandinavian forest industry
Because they are smart
Sweden and Finland is like 90% forests and our lumber industries are huge Kindly fuck off and let us cook.
Pretty obvious
Huge amount of forest, it would be a herculean task to accomplish.
We have not yet cut down all our forests so we have plenty of land to protect. Should have lawned them down and turned into autobahns so this would be cheaper
You can take away their Nokia phones, you can take away their paper industry but you’ll never take their forests!
forests are unironically the single biggest natural resource that led to Finlands modernisation
1 practical Example. If one farmer planted forrest on an area that was not economical suitable for growing barley or wheat. (This has happens in many areas in sweden) Should he cut down the forest (what EU don’t want to do) and be forced to plant something that is not economical suitable? 2nd problem. Restauration according to what year? Year 1850, 1920 or 1960?
Well, problem with nature preservation is that we need to use the wood for sustainable building materials...
Not the idea of regulation but how it is being worded. The issues come from details of what is involved. For example, there are large amount rapids used for hydropower, swamps that were used for peat and so on. It would be impossible task with the how the proposition is written now. Official stance is that regulation does not take into account different member states: [https://valtioneuvosto.fi/en/-/1410903/eu-s-nature-restoration-regulation-supported-by-member-states-regulation-into-force-in-july-august](https://valtioneuvosto.fi/en/-/1410903/eu-s-nature-restoration-regulation-supported-by-member-states-regulation-into-force-in-july-august)
This is as usual a very complex issue put in way too simple terms. What they are against is not the restoration of nature. They are against the proposed regulation on the restoration of nature. At least that‘s what I think is happening. As an example: see the USA. Everyone agrees that we need to protect children from accessing adult content. But doing so by having everyone hand over their personal data to adult websites is not that good of a thing.
Cental Europe had huge forests long time ago and they never planted new trees to regrown their forests after cutting them down, just turned it to farmland and because of this they get off very easily with restoration. Northern Europe has been replanting forests centuries and now we get punished heavily costing us billions to turn some forests back swamps (no lack of those). This whole deal makes absolutely no sense for Sweden and Finland and appears utterly unfair. Edit: also the "GDP benefits from restoration" are admitted to be just random quessed numbers without any reasonable backing. Finland carries 1/6th of the bill and in proportion to GDP way way more than any single other country in EU. Just plain stupid. Looks like EU aims to bankrupt Finland to be the distant nature-reservate. Just no.
Probably because the people in favour are the kind who twists everything 90 degrees without seeing any problem with that.
Cause it is a stupid idea. This thing is a monster and it is not possible to handle it. You just can't do anything cause you think it is easy and "a good idea". First you have to put some thought in it how it works and what must be done. This is the "green party problem". It is not enough to "do the right thing". Things must be done right or they will fail. There is no help in this failing idea. This won't work. I told you so. That is a problem... people hate the "I told you so guys". Especially when they are right.
Its amazing to me that we live in an age where we would rather take a portrait photo of a screen, not rotate it and post it on reddit from that phone than just take a screenshot of what you want to show and post it directly from the computer.
Finally a thread where I can say that EU is not always good for Finland, same for the Euro currency. Finland is better off with more independence and less regulation, and go back to the old currency. It just makes more sense and more beneficial for the country Normally I will be called a bot for that, discussion on the internet is dead
Lol, you make a good point! As soon as you are a tiny little bit EU-critical in r/Europe the downvoting and name calling begins. I was even called a Russian bot once... As for the new law... Let the mid-european countries handle their forests and the northern countries theirs. Problem solved.
Timber, really.
Why does finland get two names ?
Is no one else going to complain about OP taking this photo in landscape mode? Like, I thought they taught this rule in elementary schools by this point.
Sweden relies on forestry as a major resource of the country. It's similar to deciding that Norway can't extract its oil. As a Swede, I welcome a healthy biodiversity and thriving nature, but then I request that the EU subsidizes the cost of losing large parts of our forestry sector. That obviously won't happen, so that leaves us in a situation where the EU is trying to push regulation that will cripple several economies for the sake of nature. It's easy to vote for consequences that another party needs to bear.
Our economy is already in shambles and this thoughtless pipe dream law would be a nail in our coffin along with the bottle recycling law.