Forests
37 to 39 per cent of Norway’s area is forested. Of this, almost half is productive forest (forest with an annual productive capacity of at least 1 m3/ha). This equals about 23 per cent of the total land area of Norway. Conifers and birch dominate. Almost half of this forested area is managed in combination with pastures. The annual felling volume has been relatively stable for the last 80 years, while the growing stock of forest and the annual increase of new forest have doubled during this period. In the last 20 years, the annual planted area and the area of seeding forest have more than halved, and the building of woodland roads has been reduced to a tenth.
Forest conservation conflicts have been discussed repeatedly by the Norwegian Parliament. A scheme involving voluntary conservation
was launched in 2000 and has enjoyed wide political support, also from forest owners. Since 2003 nearly all new processes to conserve forest on private land have been in form of voluntary conservation. Under the voluntary conservation scheme an area of something in excess of 500 km2 has been conserved