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Time to Apply for the NordGen/SNS Forest Scholarships

Date: 2020.12.15

Each year, NordGen Forest, together with Nordic Forest Research (SNS), opens a call for scholarships aimed at those working or studying within forestry. One of the former beneficiaries is Elin Persson. She used her granted funds for travelling to and from the Swedish Agricultural University (SLU) in Uppsala, including accommodation and for visiting the nursery she cooperated with for her master thesis.

NordGen Forest’s scholarships are granted in cooperation with SNS. Each applicant can be granted up to 20,000 NOK. The call opens the 15th of December and closes on the 15th of February.

“The scholarships should contribute to common Nordic benefit by supporting education, continuing education and knowledge exchange for persons working or studying within forest seed or plant production, regeneration methods and tree breeding in the Nordic countries”, said Kjersti Bakkebø Fjellstad, Section Leader for NordGen Forest.

Important issue for the forest industry

The criteria above fitted well into Elin Persson’s application which was sent in by her supervisor Åke Olson. Elin Persson was studying Master of Science in Forestry in Umeå and wanted to write her thesis at SLU in Uppsala, where there was an ongoing project within the field – biological control of fungal diseases in forest nurseries.

” Due to both environmental and health reasons, it’s important for the industry to find biological control methods that can replace the chemical ones. The intense growth of pine and spruce seedlings in forest nurseries creates a conducive environment for diseases”, said Åke Olson, Docent at SLU in Uppsala and Elin Persson’s thesis supervisor.

Detrimental funding

In her master thesis, Elin Persson tested four different biological control products, available on the market, in cooperation with the nursery Svenska skogsplantor in Kilåmon, northern Sweden. Two of the pesticides have been used in forest plant nurseries before while two of them have only been used on other plants. The growth and health status of the plants were examined and compared. And the fungal communities were studied using DNA-barcoding analysis.

”NordGen Forest’s scholarship was absolutely crucial for Elin to conduct her master thesis. Without it, it would be impossible since we at SLU in Uppsala don’t have any similar funds to offer students to pay for this kind of expenses. The scholarship enabled better exchange between SLU in Umeå and Uppsala, a great benefit for both us at the University and for the students”, Åke Olson concludes.