What to read after Recent trends in forest cover change. A comparison between Finland and Germany?

Essay from the year 2018 in the subject Environmental Sciences, grade: 1,0, Eötvös Loránd Tudományegytem, language: English, abstract: The immense importance of forests as a support to humankind are overarching and far-reaching. Forests with their vast flora and fauna play an essential part in fighting rural poverty, securing food supply and providing suitable livelihoods. They are one of the most relevant factors in delivering vital long-term services of the environment, such as clean air and water, mitigation of climate change effects and preservation of biodiversity. 1,169 million tons of CO2 are bound in living forests or dead wood and hereby help bind one of the most damaging greenhouse gases. Further forest functions according to Häusler and Scherer-Lorenzen are the utility function, conservational function (regulation of water balance and climate, protection from avalanches and erosion, protection from noises and protection from immissions), recreational function and nature protection function (species, biotope and process conservation). Global forests cover an area of over four billion hectares of land surface. The three countries with greatest share of forest cover are Canada, Russia and Brazil which make up to 40% of the global forests. Europe’s forests cover 159 million hectares, of which 11% are under special protection. While the protection focus of Non-Governmental Organisation mostly lies on regions with rainforest, this paper tries to concentrate on European forests with the example countries of Finland and Germany. As the seventh and eight biggest countries in Europe according to the land surface they play a key role in forest cover change on the continent. In a first step the status quo shall be described in both countries and only in the second part a comparison of their forest cover change regarding growth and drain of forests will be taken into account.