Farmers on the move

After an exceptionally long winter, the spring finally arrived. After the first of May farmers started to worry:"When can we start sowing? Did the farmer next door begin already? Will we be able to finish sowing before the rain comes? I've been told that farmers have already started sowing in Pori. Well, don't worry; they have to sow on those muddy clay areas..."

Such thoughts were most likely expressed in May on many farms in Finland. The warm weather on Ascension Day meant the start of the sowing season on most farms. While writing this article spring sowing is being carried out in most parts of the country and already completed in others.

Sowing time brings tractors on the roads

For the Finns an increase in tractor traffic on the roads indicates the start of the sowing season. The farmers' parcels of arable land are not always located close to the homesteads, but several kilometers away. Often the only route to the parcels goes along the main road.

Among the tractors, ordinary motorists, trucks and motorcycles weave in and out of traffic. It is almost impossible to avoid dangerous situations. The hours spent on the road are directly reduced from the farmers' earnings. The price of petrol seems to be constantly on the rise and a water-driven tractor has not yet been invented. And worst of all is that the hours spent on the road are taken off the actual work on the fields.

Land reallotment brings fields closer to farmers

The National Land Survey (NLS) supports the idea of moving farmers back to the fields from the roads. The NLS has introduced various land reallotment projects in order to reduce unnecessary travelling on the roads and to decrease the costs of farming. Land reallotment allows increasing the size of the parcels, and parcels can be exchanged to be located closer to the homesteads. Thus, the hours the farmers spend on the roads are reduced and more time can be spent on actual farm work.

In recent years, farmers' interest in land reallotment has increased. I think this shows that Finnish farmers have faith in the future and they are ready to open-mindedly develop their work for generations to come.

Currently land reallotment projects are carried out in Finland on more than one hundred thousand hectares. Thousands of farmers are involved in these projects. Most of the land reallotment projects are carried out in western parts of the country but a few have also been started in eastern Finland.

The average size of a project is approximately one thousand hectares, which in practice means that one reallotment project includes the fields of an entire village. Rearranging the parcels of land of a particular farm is never easy. The fields of a farm may have been owned by the same family for centuries or grandmother can still recall how grandpa ploughed the fields when returning home from war. Farmers show a considerable sign of trust towards the NLS staff when they decide to take part in land reallotment. The NLS is able to reclaim this trust by providing customer-oriented and efficient service.

Also this spring Finnish farmers were able to start sowing on new realloted parcels of land on an area totaling about 10 000 hectares of arable land.

Kalle Konttinen
Head of Reallotments
Pirkanmaa-Satakunta District Survey Office