Protection for the song lands of Karelia

At the beginning of August the government of the Karelian Republic approved the establishment of the Kalevala National Park. The forests and villages of the area were the homeland of the ancient rune singers and were travelled by Elias Lönnrot in the 1800s.

‘When satellite pictures became widespread in the 1970s, we noticed that the extensive Viena Karelia forests near to the Finnish border had almost completely been spared from felling,’ writes Professor Rauno Ruuhijärvi in the preface of the publication on the Kalevala National Park.

The Finnish Ministry for the Environment and the Karelian Republic started to cooperate to promote protection of the forests that had been spared completely from felling. The region’s forests were studied preliminarily from 1992-1994 and in 1997 a proposal was made that a large conservation area be established within Vienansalo area and named the Kalevala National Park. At the beginning of August 2002, the government of the Karelian Republic approved the establishment of a 74,400-hectare Kalevala National Park.

The establishment of the National Park itself is still dependent on a decision from the Russian Federal Government. The park is, however, on the list of federal conservation areas to be established in the Russian Federation by 2010.

The feel of a real forest

‘When you’ve spent a couple of days walking in the pristine Viena forests, hearing nothing but the sounds of nature, you begin to realise what a real forest is,’ enthuses Senior Scientist Tapio Lindholm from the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE). Capercaillie, black grouse, wolves and bears can all be found in these extensive forests, which have not even been blemished by forest lorry roads. The region contains pine and spruce stands, paludific forests, flourishing stream banks, poor fens, natural mires, small streams and lakes. There is also an abundance of fungi and fauna species that depend on rotten wood, and the region is a natural habitat to many rare and endangered species.

The Kalevala National Park is an important part of the Green Belt border area between Finland and the Russian Federation. The Green Belt is made up of well-preserved forest and mire ecosystems.

In the homeland of the rune singers

Elias Lönnrot travelled through the landscapes of the Kalevala National Park between 1830-1840 collecting the main runes for the Kalevala epic.

The park encompasses the village of Venehjärvi and, in the eastern corner of the park, Vuokkiniemi. Vuokkiniemi has a population of about five hundred and Venehjärvi approximately twenty. Vuokkiniemi has its own school.

‘The locals support conservation of the region because they live almost wholly in a natural economy where they fish, collect berries and mushrooms. Even after the establishment of the conservation area they will be entitled to use the nearby forest resources around them for their domestic needs,’ explains Senior Scientist Tapio Lindholm.

‘I visited the villages of Vuokkiniemi and Venehjärvi a couple of years ago. There are no longer any ancient rune singers, but the people of Venehjärvi in particular remember the old traditions of the village well,’ says Senior Researcher Anneli Asplund from the Finnish Literature Society. ‘The Viena Karelia song tradition was to sing about everything, as songs represented special narrative stories. The people also sang wedding songs and lamentations.’

The village of Latvajärvi is situated on the southern border of the Kalevala National Park and used to be home to the master rune singer Arhippa Perttunen. The village is on the border zone and is difficult to access nowadays. Asplund visited the village, though only one family lived there anymore.

Arhippa Perttunen’s son Miihkali was also a rune singer. He died in 1899. Many of his texts and compositions have been recorded.

Park twinning cooperation

A twin park for the Kalevala National Park is to be established on the Finnish side.

‘The idea of park twinning cooperation is to develop close cooperation between parks on both sides of the border,’ explains Senior Planner Lassi Karivalo from the Natural Heritage Services unit of the Finnish Forest and Park Service.

‘Eco-tourism and cultural tourism would both be linked with the Kalevala Park cooperation. Park twinning cooperation also incorporates information exchange between biology experts, as well as standardising inventories to make them comparable.

A real patchwork quilt on the Finnish side

‘The planned twin park on the Finnish side of the border is a real patchwork quilt,’ explains Nature Conservation Counsellor Pekka Salminen from the Finnish Ministry of the Environment.

Most of the areas are already protected by the old-growth forests conservation programme, and a number of the areas are legally protected nature conservation areas. All of the areas are also in the Natura 2000 proposal. Should there be a desire to establish a single Kalevala Park conservation area it would mean having to amend a number of existing laws and to abolish the legal bases of old conservation areas.

‘That’s why the aim is to proceed so that all the areas not currently protected by law would be turned into protected areas by decree. The combined surface area of these areas is approximately 13,000 hectares,’ Salminen continues. ‘The decree could also state that these and other areas that have previously been protected nature conservation areas be categorised as belonging to the Kalevala Park. On the Finnish side, the Karelia Park would be approximately 23,000 hectares in size. The decree could be passed as early as autumn this year.’

The 2,400 or so hectares of rich and diverse forest of Malahvia, located in the centre of the Finnish part of the park is still a slightly controversial topic. The forest is in Natura and is protected by the Forestry Act but the old-growth forests conservation working group has proposed that, in the future, it be turned into a conservation area. Most of the area would, however, remain in its natural state. Within the framework of the Natura programme, a maintenance and upkeep plan will be drawn up for the area.

Further information:

www.ymparisto.fi/kvasiat/lahialue/venmetsa/venmetsa.htm

Literature:

*Natural Complexes, Flora and Fauna of the Proposed Kalevala National Park, the Finnish Envi-ronment series, Nr. 577, September 2002
*Martti Haavio, The last Rune Singers (1943), 3rd edition 1985
*I.K.Inha, Photographer in Viena Karelia 1894
*I.K.Inha, Song lands of the Kalevala (1911), 3rd edition 1999

Trips to Vienankarjala are organised by Juminkeko, based in Kuhmo, www.juminkeko.fi. The company is run by Markku and Sirpa Nieminen (tel. +358 (0)8 6530 670) and operates in cooperation with the Arhippa Perttunen Foundation.

Leena Huttunen
Published in magazine Ympäristö 6/2002

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