Dr. Reino Pulkk
The need for sustainable forest management practices - and the graduates who can execute them - has never been greater.
Dr. Reino Pulkki has spent his career advocating for sound and efficient harvesting methods and systems, which will maintain Canada's healthy, abundant forests while continuing to meet demands for wood and wood products.
Forests, Dr. Pulkki stresses, are a precious natural resource. While responsible for multiple products, from yeast to postage stamps, they're also a critical player in many ecosystems, essential for maintaining soil fertility and providing fresh water, clean air, and a habitat for many woodland creatures.
But forests are also the focus of a profitable national industry, generating over $32 billion to the balance of trade - more than energy, fishing, mining, and agriculture combined. Additionally, over 800,000 Canadian jobs are dependent on the sector.
Consequently, a large part of Dr. Pulkki's job is spent preparing master's and PhD students to tackle this national dilemma as the demands for products and space continue to escalate.
His students also have an opportunity to study the global market as Dr. Pulkki regularly travels for conferences and special assignments. His adventures include a year on sabbatical at Stellenbosch University in South Africa and participation in the Global Fibre Supply Strategy in Rome at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. He's also been invited to lecture at several events, including the NSERC Value Chain Optimization Summer Schools.
His students get to travel as well - in fact a few recently returned from the 7th World Forestry Congress in Quebec. But perhaps what's most beneficial about forestry at Lakehead is the opportunity to pursue projects which, according to Dr. Pulkki, are anything but restrictive. From exploring how to use indigenous livestock to maintain cultural forest landscapes to analyzing wood supply strategies in South Africa to examining the socio-economic impact of wood biomass utilization for energy production, his students are actively engaged in solving real-world problems.