Helsinki mulls to sell 200 hectares land for nature conservation

The City of Helsinki is planning to sell a forest area in Kauhala, Kirkkonummi, to the Finnish Natural Heritage Foundation, said the city in a press release on Friday.

The City and the Foundation have been negotiating the land sale in which a forest area of about 200 hectares would be transferred.

The foundation’s objective is to find a nature reserve in Kauhala.

The Helsinki Urban Environment Committee will process the proposal on the sale in its meeting on 25 March. The proposed sale price is 1.9 million euros.

The purpose of the Finnish Natural Heritage Foundation, established in 1995, is to protect Finnish nature and especially its forests.

With donated funds, the foundation acquires nature areas and facilitates their permanent conservation based on the Nature Conservation Act.

If this land sale is realised, it will more than triple the land ownership of the Foundation in the Uusimaa region. The foundation currently owns 78 hectares of nature reserves in Uusimaa.

The City of Helsinki’s objective is to mainly give up land ownership of areas that are not linked to the City’s core operations and which are located outside its municipal borders.

A nature study related to the Uusimaa regional planning has estimated that a large part of the Kauhala area is among the most valuable unprotected forest areas in the province.

The Urban Environment Committee has previously decreed that Helsinki can sell its notable natural sites – in addition to other areas – in its neighbouring municipalities, as long as the purpose of the buyer’s actions is to preserve or strengthen the nature values. A buyer meeting these standards has been sought for the Kauhala site for a long time.

The areas for sale in Kauhala have been under Helsinki’s ownership since the 1960s.

The City has no operations of its own in the area, and it has not been used for forestry in a long while.