[vintagedave]

> The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry has quite a bit of power, and there’s an obvious conflict of interests in having the double portfolio of both protecting natural land and exploiting it economically.

When writing the article, multiple people I spoke to said the same think about the RMK here in Estonia. I believe preservation and exploitation should be separated.

> they have never seen real, ecologically diverse woodland with ongoing natural succession.

Yes! And even I have only rarely. It only happens with time and care (often, to make it faster in terms of restoration of forests, specific caretaking/treekeeping actions) though. And the time is decades to centuries.