Kartlegging av historisk og nåværende landskaps- og ressursbruk i Finnmark

Abstract

Pursuant to the Finnmark Act, the Finnmark Commission was established in order to identify potentially existing collective or individual use- and property rights on land formerly defined as state-owned in Finnmark. The Commission charged the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research (NIKU) with reviewing historical and current land- and resource use within selected survey areas. NIKU conducted several large-scale map-based surveys concerning individual and communal traditional use, as well as common understandings of the rights situation related to land- and resource use. Local knowledge describing traditional land- and resource use has so far been deemed of value for the ongoing rights processes in Finnmark. There is, however, little to suggest that the physical traces of the described use have had an important place in either the proceedings or the decisions made so far. In our opinion, cultural heritage sites and local knowledge are important sources of information for a time period when written sources and public documents are less than adequate, and viewed together such data contribute to a broader understanding of both cultural heritage sites and the relationship between sites and historic land- and resource use.