One of Europe’s forest giants, the Metsä Group, will establish its own PEFC group scheme, allowing Metsäliitto Cooperative’s bonus members and contract customers to certify their forests under its management. The move is intended to reinforce the credibility of PEFC certification and secure a steady supply of certified wood for the company’s mills by taking direct responsibility for compliance.
“By establishing this new group, we want to strengthen the position and profile of PEFC certification, bear even more responsibility for compliance with PEFC certification, and thus ensure the continued availability of PEFC‑certified wood to our industrial customers,” said Juha Jumppanen, Metsä Group’s Executive Vice President for Wood Supply and Forest Services, who added that the current system includes “individual actors who are insufficiently committed to complying with the certification requirements and to carrying out the rectifications of shortcomings required of them.”
“We want to keep things in our own hands.”
Juha Jumppanen, Metsä Group’s Executive Vice President for Wood Supply and Forest Services
According to Metsä, certification, whether PEFC or FSC, is the clearest way to show sustainability is embedded in forest management and tracked through the chain of custody. Wood Central understands that customers will start seeing the changes during wood trading in 2026, when PEFC criteria will be more prominently enforced, and agreements to join the new group scheme will be finalised.
“We consider it important that our owner‑members understand the benefits of PEFC certification,” Jumppanen said, who added that alongside the new group certification scheme, Metsä will continue offering FSC certification, allowing estates to participate in both systems.
Metsä Group is also reshaping how it manages its wood trade.
Last month, the company introduced a data analytics-based operating model in which soil bearing capacity and prevailing weather conditions determine the timing of felling at sites. Beginning November 1, 2025, soil bearing capacity will also be used as a pricing factor in all stumpage sales, replacing the traditional measure of harvestability linked to seasonal conditions.
“To date, harvesting has been carried out based on a seasonally bound harvesting time without paying attention to the optimal time of individual felling sites. We’re now aiming for even better customer experience and harvesting results in our owner‑members’ forests by combining extensive datasets and our solid harvesting competence in a new way,” said Juho Rantala, Senior Vice President for Wood Trade and Forest Services.
Wood Central understands that the new model draws on data from the National Land Survey of Finland, the Geological Survey of Finland, and Natural Resources Institute Finland to classify felling sites into three categories of bearing capacity: good, normal, or limited. This, combined with real‑time weather information, allows the Metsä system to estimate the optimal harvesting time for each site. By separate agreement, harvesting can be restricted to winter conditions.
“Climate change is already challenging our operating models in Finland, as abnormal weather conditions affect and complicate harvesting. As has been seen recently—and increasingly so due to global warming—the lack of long frost seasons can lead to weaker winter harvesting conditions than in dry summer periods. Analytics enable more accurate planning, which will help us optimise harvesting more evenly around the year and increase the number of felling sites harvested when the ground is unfrozen. We can also pay forest owners a better price for them than for sites harvested in winter conditions,” Rantala said.
