Current issue: 58(4)
Traditionally, European forest education has emphasized environmental conservation. Forest education reflects the needs of society. After the industrial revolution, rapidly growing forest industries needed an increasing amount of wood, and the emphasis of forestry education was on timber production on the basis of sustained yield, and on efforts for progressively raising yields.
The technical and economic development of the recent decades introduced two themes in the environmental content of forest education: 1) The changing role of forests in society increase importance of protection and recreational functions of forests, and 2) modern technology has caused great changes in the forestry itself. These changes have to be taken into account also in the forest education. The environmental content of forest education can be divided into two broad fields, the ecological basis and environmental influences of various forest operations, and forest management for non-production uses. In both fields university curricula include a) basic courses, obligatory for all forestry students, b) optional courses, and c) advanced courses for higher degrees.
The PDF includes a summary in Finnish.