Sweden

Forest area doubled in last 100 years

Article by Robert Spannlang | 08.01.2019 - 07:43
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In Sweden chopping down trees is big business © Södra

Sweden holds just under 1% of the world’s commercial forest areas and provides 10% of the sawn timber, pulp and paper that is traded on the global market, according to qrius.com. Still, the Scandinavian country has more forest now than it did a century ago – when it had only a fraction of its current population. After decades of decline in Sweden’s forest in the 19th century, caused by farming, housing construction, wood for fuel, charcoal for the iron industry, and later as a source of logs for timber and pulping, the first Forestry Act was passed in 1903 with the intention of reversing the decline. Since then, for every tree that was chopped down, another had to be planted. In addition, the legislation also limited the amount of timber that could be harvested. Today, annual growth stands at around 120 million forest cubic metres, and each year around 90 million forest cubic metres of that growth is harvested. Some 260.000 people directly or indirectly depend on income from the forest industry.

Still, Swedish ecologists keep pointing out that as forest cover is increasing, the levels of biodiversity and old growth forest is going down: Trees felled in clear cuts are often replaced by trees of just a few species that are commercially interesting.