Afforestation creates carbon sinks by planting more trees that absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and release oxygen. Carbon sinks are defined as “anything that absorbs more carbon from the atmosphere than it releases.” As carbon sinks increase, forest owners contribute in mitigating climate change.
In Finland, there is an estimated 120,000 hectares of wasteland suitable for afforestation. These fields and peat production areas are larger than the Finnish cities of Helsinki, Tampere and Turku. To encourage forest owners to apply for afforestation subsidies and plant trees in wastelands, we developed a new digital services platform for the Finnish Forest Centre.
The Finnish Forest Centre is a state-funded organization tasked with promoting forest-based livelihoods, enforcing forest legislation and collecting and sharing forest data. It develops and maintains information systems that help to perform these tasks.
Developing a user-friendly service to ease the application process
Beginning March 2021, applications for subsidies can be submitted to the Finnish Forest Centre via the existing process. However, a significant increase in applications is expected once the new platform is implemented. The user-friendly solution, which uses maps from Suomi.fi and Microsoft Azure cloud service, makes it easier and faster to submit applications and notify users.
As part of our commitment to protect the environment and address climate change, it is rewarding to be involved in an opportunity that converts economically unprofitable wasteland into forests that produce wood and build carbon sinks.
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