Final meeting North Karelia
The North Karelian Stakeholder Group gathered up for the last time on 6th of October in Joensuu. The ending of project is close, but discussion was already heading to future plans and ideas! The attendees in the meeting represented public and private actors and organizations at the sector.
The main topics at the meeting were the results of the project and future plans. The results were presented by Mikko Kurttila, Jari Miina and Veera Tahvanainen, one work package at the time.
After the presentations the ideas and usefulness of the results were discussed. Especially the producing of wild forest products gained a lot of attention. It was discussed that concentrating on the wild forest products that cannot be collected by the everyman's rights would be more attractive for the forest owner; hence more research could be useful at that area.
Secondly the development of the sector was discussed and the stakeholder group was happy, that the sector has gradually been formally recognized (Sector Report of Business Sector Services for natural products, Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment of Finland). However there are still many things to do and develop. Trends and new enterprises are drawing attention towards this sector, which is a positive thing.
At the end of the meeting expectations of stakeholders from the first RSG meeting were reflected with the results of the project. Most expectations were answered at least to some extent. The atmosphere at the stakeholder group was positive and the results of the project were considered useful. And most importantly, the results form a good baseline for new activities, from which some have already started!
