Day 073 - 13 Jan 95 - Page 23
1 that. Then it says: "In the more recent past, opposition
2 arose because of the technological approach employed in
3 forestry, the clumsiness of logging machines, the
4 stereotyped measures applied, and the large size of logging
5 operations in areas where ownership made it possible. That
6 was when the forestry profession lost the confidence of the
7 public."
8
9 It then goes on to say: "Green values have gained a
10 foothold in places where purely economic values used to
11 prevail." In fact, on page 21 it goes on and talks about
12 the endangered species.
13
14 Q. Please do so. I have not a copy, but you quote the
15 extracts you feel important.
16 A. There is a series of paragraphs headed: "Finland's
17 Endangered Species. There are more than 40,000 animal and
18 plant species in Finland with some of them poorly known.
19 According to recent estimates, 1,692 of these are
20 classified as being endangered species. ... The number of
21 species that have so far become extinct is 138 (i.e. no
22 sure observations have been reported of these species since
23 1965)."
24
25 It then deals with this in a bit more detail and then goes
26 on: "Nearly half of the endangered animal and plant
27 species live in forests. Herb-rich sites and old forests
28 on heathland soils are particularly favoured by them."
29
30 Page 22: "Ever tightening international competition has
31 made it increasingly difficult for the Finnish forest
32 industry to produce profits".
33
34 I would just say that forestry is a very competitive
35 market. At the moment Finland is suffering 20 per cent
36 unemployment, and this is one of the reasons they are now
37 trying to show, change their forest management because of
38 consumer pressure recognising the bad management in the
39 past. They are now changing their management, not
40 necessarily because the forest industry likes biodiversity
41 (though I think many people within the forest industry do
42 care about this), but in the international market their
43 image went from beautiful to bad and they are now trying to
44 get it back to beautiful again.
45
46 Yes, it says here, going on with "Much Can Be Done - At
47 Little Cost": "There is nowadays a dearth of decaying
48 trees in our forests. Such timber represents a special
49 biotope for invertebrates and fungi. The stringent quality
50 demanded by industry concerning timber raw material has
51 made dead and decaying trees almost worthless [to the
52 industry]". Very worthwhile to the species that inhabit
53 them, of course.
54
55 "It makes great sense to leave this material where it
56 stands or lies; the same applies to aspen and other such
57 hardwood species that the industry does not want." I would
58 point out that in Canada now aspen is being widely used for
59 paper pulp in Alberta. The new mill, Alpax(?) mill in
60 Athabasca in Northern Alberta is taking 1600 tonnes a day
