The good or even excellent cooperation between the Latvian State Forest Research Institute “Silava” and the Forest Research Station helped facilitate several (at least 3) interesting forestry science events this year – seminars for the forestry sector on the rehabilitation of the gradual felling concept in forestry practice. The seminars took place in the spring, even in late-snow conditions, involving forestry students, senior sector management, and representatives of forest owners in a seminar created and invited by the Forest Owners Association.

By following developments in the forest sector remotely, forest scientists have also noticed various threats, or to put it mildly, challenges that we in Latvia will have to face in the context of the European Union’s Green Deal or, more precisely, its local interpretations. In lay terms, this sentiment can be described by the word “concerns”. These were slightly increased by a recent publication in the portal Delfi by MEP Inese Vaidere entitled “Depletion or Restoration of Nature”, which, among other things, contains an intonation regarding allegedly biologically worthless Latvian forest ecosystems (“...the published data from the nature census highlight problems in the forests – only 10% of Latvian forests are biologically valuable, and they are increasingly being replaced by clear-felling”).

Without questioning the competence and high position of every MEP as a mirror of society, which will never be achievable for Latvian scientists, such an intonation, without even asking for or waiting for an investigation into the details, is quite surprising. Perhaps for forest workers, it is even depressing. Not only because, within the framework of Latvian forest science, the various criteria by which the “biological value” of Latvian forests is or has been determined have never even been discussed. Perhaps we have been convinced that every living forest stand, including young stands, is and will be a biological and other great value for our country. Therefore, there may not have been a demand from the sector for knowledge and an analytical, data-based approach in the assessment of these criteria.

The uncritical leaning of a part of Latvian society in the direction of “nature in an unfavourable state” reminded the author of the article of the wonderful tale by the Swedish author Lindgren about the summer visitors on Seacrow Island, which he read as a child. The story featured a little girl named Stina who, in her spare moments, would train a pet crow named Kalle. Stina’s determination was to teach the crow to talk, or more precisely, to say the words “get in the tub”. In the end, Stina had managed to coax a few squawks out of the crow, and could proudly tell everyone that he knew how to talk! The author did not hide the fact that only a person with a very vivid imagination could extract the words “get in the tub” from those squawks, and Stina’s imagination was certainly vivid.

Evaluating Latvian forests in the course of daily professional work, the author of the article is convinced that only people with a very vivid imagination can arrive at the opinion that Latvian nature, especially 90% of its forests, is in a worthless state, especially in comparison with the situation in active Western European lands.
Read the full article:
https://www.delfi.lv/news/versijas/jurgis-jansons-vai-pakapenisko-cirsu-atgriesanas-mezsaimniecibas-domasana-un-prakse-palidzes-padarit-to-dabai-tuvaku.d?id=55813002