Metsä Group, a leading Finnish company in the forest industry, has launched a biodiversity project that envisions advancing innovative corporate responsibility practices, aside from the most pressing issues of habitat restoration.
Finland’s forest industry is a major pillar of the country’s economy, contributing about 20% of its export revenue. With over 75% of Finland covered by forests, sustainable forestry is central to the country’s capacity to meet its climate neutrality goals, as, research shows that non-sustainable practice in the sector decrease the chances for forest to work as efficientcarbon sinks.
Companies like Metsä Group manage millions of hectares of forest and can play a key role in advancing sustainability efforts, by focusing on environmental stewardship, the responsible management and care of natural resources to ensure long-term sustainability.
Corporate responsability meets environmental stewardship
One of the company’s primary goals is to combat biodiversity loss, an issue highlighted by the European Union’s mandate to reduce biodiversity loss by 50% by 2030.
Metsä Group itself manages 5.5 million hectares, and it is setting itself standards in balancing commercial success with environmental stewardship.As part of this biodiversity push, Metsä Group has launched a flagship project focused on restoring habitats within industrial environments, starting at the group’s mill in the Finnish city of Kemi, a small town near the Swedish border.
At the heart of Metsä Group’s strategy is integrating biodiversity initiatives into its business operations. In the past, the company handled environmental programs separately from its core activities. However, Timo Lehesvirta, Metsä Group’s environemtal expert, explained that this approach was not effective, when it came to creating a shift in company culture and understanding of the importance of biodiversity restoration.
With this project, the company’s biodiversity goals are intertwined with its main objectives through ‘business-integrated solutions’. This means that sustainability is embedded in the company’s operations, rather than being a side initiative.
The Kemi’s industrial area is the first pilot for the company’s endevour to restore habitats, commenced in June 2024. If proven successful, it will be expanded to other Metsä Group’s site across seven countries.
Lehesvirta emphasizes that this is not just a compliance effort, but rather an initiative to embed sustainability into the company’s DNA: “The company is now looking for proactive, internal ownership of biodiversity-related issues. We are shifting toward strategies where employees responsible for managing biodiversity initiatives as part of our long-term planning take active roles,” he said.
A Biodiversity Strategy
In its Kemi mill industrial area surrounded by forest and the Baltic sea, the Metsä Group is adopting regenerative forestry and land-use practices to promote biodiversity, part of its broader vision for its fossil-free, zero-waste future by 2030.
Lehesvirta says the biodiversity strategy is underpinned by a ‘science-based approach’ and it is working with local and international non-for-profit organizationss to support the restoration of more than 600 hectares of the factory premises in Kemi.
Environmental group Villi Vyöhyke is running experimental trials in the mill area: “We have more than 250 different ecological restoration experiments in Finland, many of which focus on innovative solutions for promoting biodiversity in forested and open areas,” said Jere Nieminen, environmental policy researcher at Villi Vyöhyke Ry.
The biodiversity project uses new methods and approaches to nature management and ecological restoration, and explores ways to cultivate local and rare species of plants within the premises’ sandy habitats, such as the mountain everlasting wild flower.
The aim is to revitalize areas that have traditionally been seen as less hospitable for wildlife and pollinator insects, transforming them into thriving ecosystems. “Were there insects there are birds,” said Jari Miettunen, member the local brench of the bird awareness organisation BirdLife.
Miettunen, helped the organisation understand regional biodiversity needs, such as awhat kind of plants and insects are relevant to the local bird population, while monitoring the around 150 to 180 birds couples breeding in the areas, some of them rare birds like the Terek Sandpiper.
One of the main challanges has been the collection of local seeds, as they are not easily sold on the market. Nieminen and his colleague had to personally peel seeds out off plants within 20 kilometers of the restoration site, as rules are quite strict: “We have collected more than 200 species,” he told while showing pictures of his colleagues planting the different species.
Focus on Open Habitat Restoration
Metsä Group has restored 20 hectares of open habitat since the launch of the project last June. The work is complex as the team is exploring solutions for 20 kinds of open habitats within the industrial area and the area surrounding it.
One of the more experimental initiative of the Kemi mill project includes the creation of a white noise barrier using lime mud, designed to protect sensitive species from industrial noise pollution.
At this stage, Metsä Group is mainly investing in open habitat restoration, which is done inspaces like fields, industrial and urban area rather than forests: “Open habitats are much faster to restore than forests, where results can take decades,” told Nieminen.
However this type of action has no direct effects on increasing the country’s carbon sink for which logging and peatland degradation reduced the possibility for trees and peat so absorb carbon. Strengthening forest growth and maintain forest health through timely tending of seedling, standard fertilisation and by following forest management recommendations is essential to keeping the carbon in the ground.
Nieminen said his team is also trialling ecological restoration within a clear cutting area, a patch of land within the forest where there’s no more trees as they have been cut down by Metsä Group: “This is totally new practice in Finland,” said Nieminen, who said that restoration in forests will be next in line.
In the meantime, the Finnish forest industry group hasn’t put a number for the project’s budget estimate: “The implementation of the plan in Kemi will take approximately five years. After this, the solutions created must be maintained with annual management plan and their cost will depend on the options chosen,” said Lehesvirta.
As Metsä Group expands these efforts across multiple industrial sites, it is setting one of possible example for the private sector on how to strengthen ecosystems and preserve natural resources for future generations: “Our goal and vision is for this to become mainstream across both the public and private sectors,” Lehesvirta said, calling on other stakeholders to join in the fight against biodiversity loss.
