Mārtiņš Līdums’ path to the position of director of the Forest Research Station has been quite long and winding, but very logical. As he reveals himself, the seed was sown in childhood, when his uncle, a forester, would sometimes take him along on his rounds, so by his teenage years, he already knew that he wanted his future to be linked to the forest. That is exactly what happened – after secondary school, he enrolled at Ogre Technical School and spent his summers working on young stand tending and other forestry tasks. He then continued his education at the Faculty of Forestry of the Latvia University of Life Sciences and Technologies.

For a while, he tried his hand at woodworking, but he quickly realised it was not his calling, so he swapped woodworking for a forester's role. That was when his career in forest management began: forest ranger, forester, hunting and fire protection engineer, head of the Forest Resources and Hunting Division at the Ministry of Agriculture, and deputy director general of the State Forest Service. Finally, he accepted the challenge to “get back to the forest from the piles of paperwork”, which resulted in him spending his first five years at the Forest Research Station, with at least five more to come, as his employment contract has been extended.