The Expert Council on Nature Reserves sent recommendations on the development of protected areas to the Ministry of Natural Resources

The expert council on nature reserves sent the head of the Ministry of Natural Resources, Alexander Kozlov, its recommendations on the development of a network of specially protected natural areas (SPNA) in Russia. Ecologists ask to discuss the creation of new protected areas more often with the scientific community. Experts interviewed by Kommersant indicate that within the framework of the national project “Ecology”, at least 24 new protected areas should appear in Russia by the end of 2024, and “for the sake of hastily closing the indicators, a too formal approach is being used.” The Ministry of Natural Resources assures that work within the framework of the national project is proceeding “as usual.” However, the department is ready to “consider all relevant proposals when they are received in the prescribed manner.”

The expert council on nature reserves sent the head of the Ministry of Natural Resources, Alexander Kozlov, a list of recommendations for expanding the network of federal protected areas in Russia. Experts prepared it based on the results of the thematic meeting “Prospects for the development of a geographical network of specially protected natural areas of federal significance” at the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

The recommendations (available to Kommersant) note that “the practice of creating new protected areas even in difficult political and socio-economic conditions is a centuries-old domestic environmental tradition, and new protected areas were created during the First World War, the Civil and Great Patriotic Wars and years of post-war devastation.”

And although “in the last 30 years, the development of the system of protected areas has been declared as one of the key directions of state environmental policy,” today this process, according to the authors, occurs “in the absence of proper scientific justification.” This leads to “the vicious practice of creating protected areas where it is easier,” the Expert Council complains, and “the pursuit of formal quantitative indicators in no way works to achieve the goals of forming a geographical network of protected areas and only devalues ​​the idea of ​​conservation.”

One of the authors of the recommendations, Honored Ecologist of the Russian Federation Vsevolod Stepanitsky, in a conversation with Kommersant, said that the problem is also related to the ill-conceived implementation of the Ecology national project.

The expert is sure that the Ministry of Natural Resources is simply “closing the indicators”, therefore “creating new protected areas where it is easier and faster, without proper scientific justification and expressed priorities.” As an example, Mr. Stepanitsky pointed out the federal reserves “Paraskiny Lakes” and “Kazantipsky Marine” created in 2020. In his opinion, these natural areas are “insignificant” and have no biosphere value.

Arkady Tishkov, head of the laboratory at the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, points out that protected areas in Russia are distributed very unevenly.

This is a big problem for the representation of biological and landscape diversity, he says: “Historically, our national parks were created based on economic needs. If the area was not of interest to anyone for domestic purposes, you can make a nature reserve.” That is why, according to the ecologist, Russia has a wide network of protected areas in Yakutia, the Far East and the Arctic, “and territories on the European Plain or in the steppe zone that were affected by a powerful anthropogenic factor are almost not represented.”

Mr. Tishkov believes that this problem needs to be solved urgently, but this is impossible without professional zoning and consistent planning of the network of protected areas. “It annoys me to observe that the Ministry of Natural Resources does not turn to strong specialists, of whom we have a lot in the Russian Academy of Sciences,” for expertise,” he complains.

Mikhail Stishov, a member of the expert council on nature reserves, says that when creating protected areas, they are often guided by “obvious uniqueness.” “If there are some rare charismatic species there—let’s say the Amur tiger—then we need to create them. But they often don’t understand that it is necessary to preserve the standards of natural territories, and not just rare landscapes,” the scientist laments. Mr. Stishov suggests that departments conduct more frequent consultations and discussions with the scientific and public communities – and “finally start listening to what they say.”

The authors of the recommendations consider it necessary to develop a “List of state nature reserves, national parks and state nature reserves of federal significance, planned for creation in 2025–2034, with subsequent approval by the government of the Russian Federation.” Mr. Stepanitsky notes that this practice “has been in effect for the previous four decades and was very effective, since such a list was a guideline for making informed decisions.”

Ecologists are also confident that it is necessary to “introduce an institute of scientific supervisors of project work on the creation of each specific protected area,” which will allow for high-quality scientific examination.

A separate block in the recommendations lists territories that should be given protected status. Scientists propose to create the Nizhny Novgorod Zavolzhye National Park (Nizhny Novgorod Region), the Bolshoye Tokko State Nature Reserve (Yakutia), the Pompeevsky National Park (Jewish Autonomous Region), the Gornaya Kolyvan National Park (Altai Territory), and also create the Sayansky National Park “within the approximate boundaries of the Sayansky State Nature Reserve, which was liquidated in 1951” (located on the territory of the Irkutsk region and the Krasnoyarsk Territory).

The press service of the Ministry of Natural Resources told Kommersant that “the implementation of the federal project “Preservation of biological diversity and development of ecological tourism” is carried out by the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources as usual.” When choosing a priority for the creation of protected areas, the department is guided by “instructions of the President and Government of Russia, materials from comprehensive environmental surveys of design areas prepared by leading scientific organizations in the field of environmental protection, ensuring environmental safety, rational environmental management, biodiversity conservation and conservation management, as well as expert opinions of specialists in field of biological and landscape diversity”.

The department added that the recommendations of the expert council “on revising the list of protected areas of federal significance planned for creation in 2024–2025 as a priority, as well as proposals for the development of a list of protected areas of federal significance planned for creation in 2025–2034 to the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources did not act”, while actually quoting the text of these recommendations. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Natural Resources assured that it is “ready to consider relevant proposals when they are received in the prescribed manner.”

Polina Yachmennikova