Neova AB is Sweden's largest peat producer and accounts for 71% of peat extraction, which emits more greenhouse gases than domestic aviation. The parent company Neova Oy is 51% owned by the Finnish state. The remaining percentages are owned by Finnish municipal heating plants. Finland received EUR 465 million in EU sustainable transition support in 2018 to, among other things, phase out peat extraction.
“Europe is burning to ashes and over 35,000 people have died as a result of the summer’s heat waves. Peat is a fossil material and extracting it fuels the climate collapse. Get out of Sweden, Neova! You are sabotaging our nature and increasing deadly emissions”, says Lior Tell Stefansson, spokesperson Återställ Våtmarker.
Neova AB is part of the board of the lobby organization Svensk Torv (‘Swedish peat”), which has attracted attention recently for their controversial methods against activists. Among others, the Secretary General of Svensk Torv, self-proclaimed as the “Peat General”, has copied Återställ Våtmarker’s website.
On Neova AB’s, Svensk Torv’s and the Peat General’s social media, there is incitement and threats without moderation. “Some of the things that are written can almost be called illegal threats. That people should be shot, killed, run over and buried. I can really react to that,” says the police Stefan Jalderyd in Dagens Nyheter.
“We at Restore Wetlands are always respectful and peaceful. Anything but what Neova AB and its lobby organization stand for. Is this something the Finnish parent company Neova Oy, the world's fifth largest peat producer, encourages?” says Pontus Bergendahl, spokesperson Återställ Våtmarker.
In July, outright conspiracy theories were spread on the Svensk Torv website: “It is possible to draw some lessons and parallels between associations working for Russia and the activists in Återställ Våtmarker”, writes chairman Robert Wedmo, continuing, “A hungry, cold and poor population naturally has a lower will to defend itself than the opposite.”
“I am addressing the Finnish government directly. How can you allow the spreading of lies and pure conspiracy theories to continue? Not to mention the cheating with illegal peat extraction? Shame on you!” says Pontus Bergendahl.
During the summer, Restore Wetlands has stopped Neovas AB's peat extraction at Grimsås bog for the third year in a row. This year with the startling method of sowing seeds out on the peat extraction site. The general secretary of the lobby organization Svensk Torv, Rickard Axdorff, is threatening to file a claim for damages of hundreds of millions of Swedish crowns and claimed that the seed campaign amounted to industrial sabotage.
Representatives of Återställ Våtmarker believe that the seed campaigns are putting the spotlight on Neova AB’s violation of the contract they have for peat extraction, both at Grimsås bog but also at a number of other peat extraction sites. The so-called concession agreements apply to energy peat, but Neova AB has sold the peat as cultivation peat for years. At Grimsås bog, the company tried to change the agreements to apply to peat for cultivation but was rejected by the County Administrative Board in Västa Götaland this spring. The company then appealed to the Land and Environmental Court but was rejected by this court as well.
“Grimsås bog has become a hotspot for the entire peat issue in Sweden. We know that Neova is violating the agreement as well as the direct decisions of the County Administrative Board and the Land and Environmental Court. For years they have been mining and selling peat against current agreements. Every bucket is an illegal bucket”, says Lior Tell Stefansson, spokesperson Återställ Våtmarker.
On September 1st, the Swedish government will submit Sweden's national nature restoration plan to the European Commission in accordance with the EU Nature Restoration Regulation. The report also includes the future of peat extraction in Sweden.
The parties Socialdemokraterna, Miljöpartiet and Vänsterpartiet submitted motions last October with proposals to phase out peat. The party Centerpartiet has also said in an email to Restore Wetlands that they want to ban peat mining.
Pictures from the action are free to use and are found here.