The Winds of Change: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
“It is 90 seconds to midnight.”
In early 2023 the hands on the Doomsday Clock moved even closer to midnight, now standing the closest to a global catastrophe it’s ever been. This newest update comes amidst the ongoing war in Ukraine and shows how the actions of a few men can have drastic consequences to the world around them. But it’s not just the war that got us here.
The impact that humanity has on the environment is not only undeniable, but often easily observable and one needs not to imagine the future to see mankind’s actions unravel. If we go back just over 1000 years in time to the actions of one Ingólfur Arnarson, whose search for a better life (in)directly caused degradation of a fragile environment of an island located at the cold tips of the Atlantic Ocean.
The island called The Land of Fire and Ice.
The Treeless Land.
One small step for man…
Ingólfur Arnarson is more than a statue that decorates a grassy hill in the center of Reyjavík. Often recognized as the first (Nordic) permanent settler of Iceland, he made his way over at the end of the 9th century and founded the now-capital of Reykjavík. What followed were centuries of viking colonization that left the local environment in a state of disarray, through no direct blame of their own. The people needed refuge and food and the best way to get both was to cut down the trees; on one hand the wood could then be used as firewood and to make tools and on the other hand the area could be turned into grasslands for sheep to graze on. It didn’t help that sheep fed on the seedlings, making it quite impossible for new trees to sprout. Over time, this led to a sharp decrease of the forest-covered area - from 25-40% down to a mere (below) 1% in the past century. Things were so dire that in the beginning of the 20th century there were people in Iceland who had never seen a tree, and others who believed forests simply couldn’t be cultivated. At that point in time, however, there was a turning point and, as fate would have it, it was because of the actions of one man - Hákon Bjarnason.
Hákon played a pivotal role in the early days of the Icelandic Forestry Association (Skógræktarfélag Íslands), having been present upon its founding and going as far as donating his own land to further fund the work of the association. His work was built on top of that of other pioneers who came before him, but his approach to the conservation of Icelandic nature was practical, academic and entrepreneurial and his actions - revolutionary.
“It has been our biggest challenge to bring back the forest cover; there is no other country in Europe that has a smaller forest coverage, except the Vatican,” says Einar Örn Jónsson, a journalist-turned-forester. Having been involved with IFA for a number of years, Einar is quite familiar with Hákon, to whom he attributes much of the IFA’s current prominence seen in great part in the purple haze that engulfs the island every spring. “He was one of the pioneers in Icelandic forestry who brought lupine [to Iceland], back in 1945. He planted it in eroded areas to improve the soil so the trees could then be planted.”
The lupine: A solution or a nuisance?
The lupine is often referred to as a pioneer plant because of its ability to thrive in harsh growing conditions and supply the soil with nutrients over time. Lupine has been sowed in various places in Iceland with the intent of improving growing conditions for other plants - however, this has been fiercely criticised by some because of its rapid growth and the question of whether it gives way to other plants.
Out of the woods
The harsh climate so far North has affected the biodiversity of Iceland to the extent that today one can only find 3 trees native to Iceland: downy birch (Betula pubescens), a very uncommon rowan (Sorbus aucuparia) and extremely rare aspen (Populus tremula) which can only be found in around 6 places. To make matters worse, all three of these species more often grow as shrubs, rather than trees, reaching a maximum height of 15 meters.
“The famous joke about Icelandic forests is ‘What to do when you get lost in the Icelandic forest? You just stand up,’” Aneta Feręczkowska happily shares, as she reminisces on her volunteering summer in Iceland. She was part of a group of five volunteers from different countries who came to Iceland in 2022 to assist IFA, as a part of their ‘Supporting local forestry in Iceland’ project.
“Almost every month we went somewhere for a week like, for example, we went to Bíldudalur and did a bit of forest maintenance, building forest paths and arranging small areas for the locals. In Stykkishólmur we were involved in debranching and making forests more accessible to locals and visitors. In our base camp [in Úlfljótsvatn] we were planting trees and fencing the area to protect the saplings from sheep.”
Narfi “the wise man”, Rudi “the DJ”, Aneta “the nurse”, president of Iceland Guðni Th., David “the strongman”, Ana “the videographer”, and Simone “the chainsaw master”
Living on a prairie
It is believed that up to 40% of Iceland can be transformed into forests, and the Icelandic Forest Service (a state institution in charge of forest research and maintenance) is working hard towards that ideal, having set up their goal to reach 12% by the year 2100. Even though they had suffered a drop in funding following the economic crash in 2008, the situation has been improving and in 2021 there had been over 5 millions seeds planted. “The backbone of our work is the work of the volunteers,” Einar is quick to give praise as a lot of this work is done by volunteers, both local and international, with IFA serving as their professional guidance.
Trees offer us shade on a hot, summer day, tasty fruits to curb our hunger, they house small animals, protect from sandstorms and act as “the lungs of the planet”. Being a small country, Iceland is in a great position to change for the better, granted it recognizes its drawbacks in time. In the case of healing the fragile environment, the biggest responsibility lies in the hands of people. If the actions of one man can inspire change, how much better can our lives be if we’d all strive to do better?
DID YOU KNOW:
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It’s also a man-made forest with a lake rumoured to be the home of the “Icelandic Nessie” - the Lagarfljót wyrm.
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Some believe this is also the capital of the Huldufólk, or “hidden people”.