Browsing by Author "Paaja, Pipsa"

Over 60% of all the forest land in Finland is owned by private forest owners and most of these forests are owned by families. Private forest owners have been studied in Finland quite a lot, but there are still quite few studies about women owning forest land. The theory is based on previous Finnish, Swedish and American studies about female forest owners. The goals of this study were to describe women and their behaviour as forest owners as well as explore how they use forest consultation services, which background characteristics influenced the usage and how it differed from men’s behaviour. The data used in this study was Suomalainen metsänomistaja 2010 and it has been gathered during 2004-2008 via postal survey. The sample, 13,000, was divided into 13 forest centres. Valid responses were obtained 6318, so the percentage of responses was 49,2%. The background characteristics and behaviour of female forest owners were explored by using means and cross-tabs. Linear regression model and logit-model were used to describe the usage of forest consultation services and the background characteristics influencing it. On the supposition that the amount of the female forest owners has been under estimated in previous studies (25%), the purpose of this study is also to determine more exact number. Previously, the amount of female forest owners has been estimated on the strength of the respondent of the postal survey, but it hasn’t been taken into account that men are more likely to answer the survey than women. This study showed that 38% or 44% of all forest owners in Finland were women depending on the calculation method. Female forest owners were older and better educated than men, but they sold less wood as well as did less maintenance work and also their estates were smaller. Women used the forest consultation services less frequent than men. Women’s goals of owning forest were also different from men’s, since over a third of women used their forest for recreational purposes. Women were more passive forest owners than men. This can be partly explained by the large amount of women using their forest for recreational purposes. Women could be encouraged to be more active through a women’s own network. These kinds of networks have been put into practice for example in the USA.