The day commenced with an exciting programme of two presentations followed by two field trips. Our learning started with the first presentation on Forest Atmosphere interactions by Liisa Kulmala, Post-Doc in Forest- Atmosphere Interactions, UH (Forest). She discussed three important points:

1. How vegetation affects climate;
2. How climate affects productivity; and
3. How vegetation affects climate change.

The theoretical component was augmented by a practical visit to SMEAR (Station for Measuring Forest Ecosystem- Atmosphere Relations).

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The Managing Sustainable Forest Landscapes 2015 summer school has successfully commenced! Yay! The first day started (in spite of some belated confused students like us having trouble navigating their way around the campus) with an introductory lecture by Markku Kanninen, who told us about the general global trends in forestry and beyond. With the introduction to the course we got started with a couple of themes that will be developed throughout our class program.

Fobissie Kalame shared his experience of being a REDD+ negotiator- a job requiring the patience of a saint and a mind of a poker player.

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The opening day started with an introductory session. During the two hours we first spent together we got to know each others’ names, backgrounds and origins. What a diverse group! As Markku said during the session, WOW. Just wow. So much expertise from various fields packed into a single room. Certainly provides great opportunities for learning from each other! One of our goals in this course was to learn from each other, and not just from the lecturers. We feel very confident that this goal will be very well met!

Our group on the first day (missing a few students)

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