Ownership of forest land

Compiler: Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke) since 1 January 2015. The Finnish Forest Research Institute (Metla) has previously compiled the statistics.

Statistics home page:  http://stat.luke.fi/en/ownership-forest-land

Main topic: Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery

Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Yes

European Statistical System (ESS): No

Description

The statistics give information on the number and forest land area of private forest properties as well as forest property entities owned by private persons and other groups in Finland.

Content

The statistics contain information on the number of forest properties and forest property entities classified by size and forest land area. The statistics give information on the forest ownership of private persons by the region (13 forest centres) and at national level. Information on other ownership categories is only given at national level.

For private forest property entities, the statistics also provide an estimate of the number of owners in Finland as well as regional information on the average size of holdings exceeding 2 hectares in size.

Categories

Forest property entity refers to all the Finnish forest holdings of the same owner or owners. The property entity must contain a minimum of one hectare of forest land.

Forest holdings only include those farms registered by the Finnish Tax Administration that have forest land. A farm refers to an independent economic unit engaging in agricultural or forestry production. Most farms registered by the Finnish Tax Administration engage only in forestry and have no agricultural production. A forest property (farm) may consist of several properties and/or plots containing forest land.

Forest land refers to land that is available for wood production where the average annual increment of the growing stock of fully stocked trees suitable for the area during the rotation period that provides the greatest yield is, at minimum, 1 m3 over bark per hectare.

Forest property entities are classified by size based on forest land area. In the statistics, a forest property entity is recorded for the region (13 forest centres) that is located in the owner’s permanent place of residence. In the case of spouses, the place of residence is that of the elder spouse.

A forest holding comprises the forest property entities owned by the same owner within the area managed by one forest management association. Forest properties that spouses do not own together are always considered as separate forest holdings. Forest holdings are recorded for the municipality in which they are located.

Privately owned forests include forests owned by 1) a private person alone or with his/her spouse, 2) an undistributed estate of a deceased person, and 3) real property partnerships.

 Data collection and sources

The statistics are compiled from the records of the Finnish Tax Administration. It is a total statistic of the ownership and land area of all properties in Finland. The records of the Finnish Tax Administration have been combined to provide data on forest property entities in the statistics. Forest holding statistics are based on the monitoring of the statutory forest management fee by the Finnish Tax Administration.

Update frequency

The statistics are compiled annually for the calendar year.

Preparation and publication schedule

Taxation is completed in the November following the reporting year, and these statistics are published during the following January. The delay between the completion of the taxation for the year and the publication of the statistics is about 13 months.

Time series

Information on privately owned forest property entities is available from 2006, and on all forms of ownership from 2010 onwards. Information on the number and area of privately owned farms is available from 2009 onwards.