10 January 2025 | Article

Urgent Need to Save Continuity Forests 

Preserving Swedish continuity forests is vital for biodiversity, climate stability, and cultural heritage. These undisturbed forests, untouched by clear-cutting or intensive forestry, provide essential habitats for species reliant on old trees, dead wood, and natural forest structures. 

Only 3–5% of Sweden’s productive forests can be classified as continuity forests - a proportion equal to that occupied by the invasive, planted Pinus contorta. Today, strong special interests and policies favouring the forest industry pose a significant threat to these old, vital forests. Although the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency focuses on designating continuity forests as nature reserves, a lack of funding highlights the need for private initiatives to support their conservation. Furthermore, signals from the Environmental Goals Council suggest a reduction in legal protection.  

Most continuity forests are owned and managed by private landowners, many of whom are seeking alternative sources of income other than that from clearcutting. This is where fightCOtwo steps in, preserving these forests while offering economic incentives for landowners and enabling companies to support conservation through climate offsetting. By preserving continuity forests, we invest in future ecosystem services, climate solutions, and biodiversity. This is a crucial step toward a sustainable society and a rich natural heritage for future generations. 

The Benefits of Continuity Forests 

Biodiversity 

Continuity forests are irreplaceable for the conservation of many threatened species. Numerous lichens, mosses, fungi, and insects are uniquely adapted to old trees and slow-changing forest environments. These species cannot survive in intensively managed forests, where tree lifecycles are interrupted by clear-cutting and replanting with fast-growing species. Protecting continuity forests helps preserve genetic diversity and vital ecosystem services, such as pollination, pest control, and water purification. 

Climate mitigation 

Continuity forests serve as major carbon sinks. The slow-growing trees, combined with accumulated dead wood and ground vegetation, stores large amounts of carbon over extended periods. Logging continuity forests releases significant quantities of carbon dioxide and diminishes the forest’s ability to regulate the climate. Conserving these forests is therefore one of the most effective measures to combat climate change. 

Cultural and Historical Value 

For Indigenous peoples like the Sámi, as well as many local communities, continuity forests hold immense cultural and economic significance. Reindeer herding relies on ground and hanging lichens, which are abundant in these forests. Additionally, these forests preserve traces of historical land use and ancient knowledge that have been passed down through generations. 

Photo: fightCOtwo

This perspective is part of fightCOtwo’s ongoing work on long-term conservation of Swedish boreal forests, integrating verified carbon sequestration, biodiversity outcomes, and documented collaboration with the reindeer herding community and the Sámi Indigenous people.