The Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry of the University of Helsinki has awarded the Influencer of the Year award in 2018 to Professor Markku Kanninen for his longstanding significant contribution to structuring scientific research knowledge into potential solutions for preventing and adapting to climate change.
For the past fifteen years, Professor Kanninen has made an impact on key international networks and organisations, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and UN climate protection operations. He is one of the lead authors of the IPCC special report on pathways to global warming of no more than 1.5°C, published in October 2018. The report provides a tangible pathway inspiring hope for solving today’s most pressing global problem and has received extremely wide international attention.
As professor of tropical silviculture, Kanninen has focused on forestry research and increasing expertise in silviculture in the tropics, particularly in Asian countries. As an example of Kanninen’s impact in Finland, on 14 November 2018 a research group headed by him released a carbon emissions calculator tailored specifically for organisations to help them identify their environmental impact and develop their operations towards reduced emissions.