Cultural Exchange and Discus­sion Meetings on Utilizing Forest Resources for Regional Economy and Industry Between Joensuu, North Karelia, and Inje County, Gangwon State

All the repres­ent­ative organ­iz­a­tions from North Karelia, along with related insti­tu­tions and companies, extended excep­tional hospit­ality to the Korean deleg­a­tion from Inje County’s govern­ment. As part of the BIOSYS project, the deleg­a­tion success­fully completed the inter­na­tional visit as a cooper­ative effort.

By Daesung Lee and Aliisa Pöllänen

From May 12th to 16th, 2025, Korean repres­ent­at­ives from Inje County’s regional govern­ment visited Finland and the North Karelia region. Their goal was to develop plans to connect forest-based healing and active recre­ational program including food, sports, nature scenic views, and activ­ities, facil­ities by utilizing Finland’s forest envir­on­ment. They also aimed to find ways to revitalize the birch forests in Inje County, a key tourist destin­a­tion in Gangwon State, South Korea. During their visit In Finland, they visited many insti­tu­tional and nature-based areas in the North Karelia region.

Firstly, on May 12th, 2025, they met with experts in ProAgria and discussed silver birch, related mater­ials, and poten­tial ideas for events and recre­ational activ­ities to promote the local forest-based industry utilizing birch and birch forests. During the meeting in VisitKarelia, they were actively listening and learning about North Karelia’s tourism, national parks, and local values related to the tourism industry. Addition­ally, they visited and discussed with Forest Joensuu and the City of Joensuu, exploring the relation­ship with local govern­ment, industry stake­holders, and their goals. With the Inje officials, they jointly discussed possible cooper­a­tion strategies for mutual benefit.

On May 13th, 2025, the Korean deleg­a­tion met with researchers from the Univer­sity of Eastern Finland. They learned about research-based cooper­a­tion and devel­op­ment for regional forest-based indus­tries, focusing on the added value of non-timber forest products, including forest herbs and recre­ational well-being activ­ities. They also visited Natural Resources Insti­tute Finland (LUKE) in Joensuu and met scient­ists whose expertise is in mushroom and non-timber research, discussing ongoing studies and societal impacts. In the after­noon, the Regional Council of North Karelia provided inform­a­tion about the role of forestry and the forest resource sector from Finnish perspective. Engaging and fruitful dialogue took place with the local officials.

On May 14th, 2025, they visited Koli National Park to exper­i­ence nature firsthand, hiking the Koli trails and appre­ci­ating the scenic spots. They also learned about the manage­ment and admin­is­tra­tion of Koli National Park through meetings with coordin­ators from Metsähal­litus. In the after­noon, Karelia Puutec, a local Finnish wood building company that uses Finnish wood, intro­duced various sauna facil­ities and systems. Korean visitors also exper­i­enced Finnish sauna culture firsthand.

On May 15th, 2025, during a visit to the Martha Associ­ation (Pohjois-Karjalan Martat ry), they learned about the association’s social contri­bu­tions to North Karelia’s local society and activ­ities supporting local people, including local food and cultural initi­at­ives. Later in the after­noon, the Korean deleg­a­tion had a meeting with CEO of Nordic Koivu (a company produ­cing silver birch sap water) discussing their vision, markets, and poten­tial cooper­a­tion opportunities.

Finally, on May 16th, 2025, the deleg­a­tions last destin­a­tion was LUKE in Viikki, Helsinki. They discussed LUKE’s inter­na­tional cooper­a­tion efforts, viewed the extru­sion center, and explored poten­tial applic­a­tions of their facil­ities and techniques. In LUKE’s VirtuLab, they exper­i­enced virtual nature sceneries and learned about nature-based recre­ational activ­ities and forest resources.

During the business trip, the deleg­a­tion engaged with experts in North Karelia, focusing discus­sions on themes such as national parks, birch trees, wooden archi­tec­ture, gardens, healing, wellness, trails, hiking, agricul­tural products, rural economy, tourism and Nordic culture. Through knowledge and exper­i­ence exchange, the Korean deleg­a­tion identi­fied promising collab­or­a­tion oppor­tun­ities and began discus­sions with relevant hosts in North Karelia to build partnerships.

The BIOSYS North Karelia Inter­na­tional Growth Ecosystem is run by Natural Resources Insti­tute Finland / Luonnon­varakeskus as a project lead, the Regional Council of North Karelia Pohjois-Karjalan maakun­t­aliitto, Univer­sity of Eastern Finland and MKN Itä-Suomi | Rural Women´s Advisory Centre (RWAC) of Eastern Finland. The project is funded by Renewing and Competent Finland 2021–2027, EU Regional and Struc­tural Policy Programme’s Just Trans­ition Fund – JTF, and Regional Council of North Karelia.

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For more information:

Daesung Lee, [email protected]
Naomi Moriyama, [email protected]