Monitoring of forest condition in the Finnish-Russian border region

Large industrial and population centers of NW Russia and Estonia are great sources of air pollutants, which is regarded as a threat to the vitality of forests also in Finland. Therefore, the monitoring of forest condition has been set as a central goal of the Finnish-Russian cooperation in the field of environmental protection in near-border districts. Except in the vicinity of emissions sources it has been difficult to distinguish in a scientifically reliable way antropogenic symptoms from natural disturbances and epidemics.