Minister of Climate and the Environment Kai Mykkänen (NCP) met members of the public in conjunction with the party’s summer meeting in Rovaniemi on 20 August 2024. Mykkänen on Friday told Helsingin Sanomat that Stora Enso alone is responsible for compensating for the damage caused by a forest machine to a concentration of freshwater pearl mussels in Suomussalmi, Kainuu. (Roni Rekomaa – Lehtikuva)
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THERE should be no question over who should compensate for the environmental damage caused by a logging operation undertaken in Suomussalmi, Kainuu, by Stora Enso, according to Minister of Climate and the Environment Kai Mykkänen (NCP).
Mykkänen on Friday stated to Helsingin Sanomat that Stora Enso as the commissioner and executor of the operation must compensate fully for both the damage and the costs of the clean-up and rehabilitation efforts that are underway at the site.
Employees of Metsähallitus have spent recent days near the logging site carrying buckets of freshwater pearl mussels upstream in Hukkajoki River. The mussels were suffocating because the river had silted up due to a forest machine serving the logging site crossing it as many as 300 times, according to estimates based on the volume of wood harvested from the site.
The river had prior to the incident housed one of the ten largest concentrations of the endangered species in Finland.
Police are investigating the incident as aggravated environmental offence. If the pre-trial investigation produces evidence that the act was intentional, the perpetrators could be liable for millions of euros in compensation for the dead mussels, reported YLE.
Stora Enso was aware of the freshwater pearl mussel population in the river and had received clear instructions from authorities for how not to disturb the habitat, reveals an e-mail seen by Helsingin Sanomat.
Mykkänen on Friday stated that Stora Enso and its subcontractor are understandably continuing to negotiate how to share responsibility for the damage. The central administration, however, has no intention whatsoever to participate in sharing the costs of the clean-up, rescue and rehabilitation efforts.
“When you’ve operated so clearly and flagrantly against clear instructions, we can’t be talking about something that’s paid for with scarce public funds,” he emphasised to the daily.
With thousands of freshwater pearl mussels believed to be dead and the riverbed gravel – key for the survival of baby mussels – clogged with sand and slush for hundreds of metres downstream from the trail of the forest machine, Mykkänen admitted that most of the damage cannot be undone. Stora Enso, he proposed, should consider compensating for the damage by investing in protecting the species also in other parts of Finland.
Freshwater pearl mussels inhabit an estimated 140–150 rivers in Finland. Only a few of them, however, provide the species with a habitat that enables it to breed properly.
Mykkänen also called on the forest industry more broadly to commit to designating a safe zone of 50 metres along rivers with the mussels to both prevent sand and slush from trickling from the logging site to the river and to help the mussels by preserving the shadows provided by nearby trees.
Aleksi Teivainen – HT
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Source: www.helsinkitimes.fi
