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FSF Report 2

FSF Report 2

Confirmation of illegal logging within the Tunkinsky National Park

REGION: Buryat Republic, Russian Federation

DISTRICT: Tunkinsky District, Arshan village

DATES OF RIDES: August 22nd - 30th, 2003

PARTICIPANTS:

Andrei Laletin (FSF)
Nikolai Zubov (Krasnoyarsk Environmental Institute)
Valery Tolstihin (Buryat Regional Department on Lake Baikal, Ulan-Ude)
Nina Vecher (Appeal of Arshan)

The Participants, photo ©FSF

Summary

During August 2003, the FSF coordinator working with partners from Krasnoyarsk, Ulan-Ude, and local community members from Tunkinsky district of Buryat Republic confirmed violations of Russian law and investigated multiple logging operations around Arshan village and in several other places within the Tunkinsky National Park. It was the second field visit to this remarkable place that is well known in Russia for protecting beautiful forests and medicinal waters. The first visit was 2 months before in late June 2003. The situation had not improved. Moreover, several new logging sites were found within the boundaries of this internationally important National Park that were in direct conflict with the Management Plan for the Park.

Purpose

This investigation was carried out to check the scale of illegal logging within the boundaries of the Tunkinsky National Park.

Introduction

Tunkinsky National Park is an outstanding area of interest for both cultural and biodiversity reasons. It was established in May 13, 1991.

The Park covers an area of 1,168,000 hectares and contains a high proportion of relatively intact boreal forest, which is under serious threat from commercial logging operations. Consequently, the 1991 Management Plan for this Park banned all commercial operations within the boundaries of the park. Despite the importance of the Tunkinsky National Park, there are active sawmills in most villages within the National Park. This, combined with the failure to cancel forest districts within the Park boundaries, and a shortage of staff to effectively control operations in this area has led to increased reports of commercial logging within Tunkinsky National Park.

Andrei Laletin investigates illegal logging, photo ©FSF

Findings

During this fieldwork, investigators verified several new logging operations not only within the village of Arshan (that were found in a previous field visit), but in many other parts of Tunkinsky National Park that were not found during our previous visit in June.

Also, the team found many places of burnt forest from fires set by loggers to hide the evidence and traces of their crime.

Interviews with local residents indicated that the illegally felled timber was processed locally for export to Mongolia and China. Local residents also suggested that the operations were occurring with involvement of the local Administration.

Again approaches were made to the Chief of the local Administration, Mr. Viktor Chimitovich Manzaraksheev, but this time he refused to meet the team.

The Forest Inspector, Nikolay Alexandrovich Bagulov, who met with the field team during the June inspection, was on leave. But we managed to go to Keren, the center of Tunkinsky district. There we visited the office of Tunkinsky National Park and spoke to Nina Nikolaevna Krahmal - main forester of the National Park, chief of Nikolay Bagulov and all other forest inspectors. She was very friendly and told us that it is necessary to stop illegal logging in the Park, but it is not possible, because of the involvement not only of the local administration, but also the regional government (Buryat Republic). Her staff found several cases of illegal logging, but the criminals were released and not punished at all.

She reported that last year the previous chief of the local administration was accused of corruption and dismissed, but the new chief is even worse and the scale of illegal logging has actually increased. She suggested that it is desirable to stop logging and transportation of logs, but it is possible only by the order from Moscow, because the National Park is under federal jurisdiction (Ministry of Natural Resources). The Buryat government wants to change the status of Tunkinsky Park, converting it into a nature park in order to put it under their (Buryat Republic) control.

The team also had discussions with a teacher from Zun-Murino village, Zinaida Mitrofanovna Shvedova, and the Director of the Club in Zun-Murino, Olga Petrovna Shoboeva. They both told us that it is necessary to stop logging in the park. There are logging sites even in sacred places. They try to organize local people to oppose logging in the park. They told our team that there is a very high level of unemployment and alcoholism among local people. The local police force is very corrupt. They help loggers, but not people who oppose logging. The team also visited Bodarsky Bor (a pine forest) that is situated between Arshan and Keren. We found lots of places that were recently logged illegally: as usual, the most valuable parts of tree stems were taken away and we observed only lots of tree tops and branches on the ground.

A typical picture of illegal logging within the Tunkinsky National Park, photo ©FSF

Recommendations

* The Ministry of Natural Resources should be contacted to send their inspectors to check the current situation with logging in Tunkinsky National Park and to cancel all logging permissions within officially recognised Protected Areas.
* Additional financial resources should be provided to build public and governmental capacity to enforce control of logging operations.
* Foreign consumers should question the legality of timber sourced in Russia, and only purchase from reputable suppliers, preferably certified by FSC.