Protecting taiga forests through sensible management
The World Wildlife Fund Russia (WWF Russia) initiated establishment of the Boreal Wood Platform which is supposed to smooth transition to a sustainable management model for boreal (taiga) forests. The new discussion platform may also contribute to development of technological foresight and strategic planning in the forest sector. At the inaugural meeting of the platform on 19 May, HSE was represented by Ilya Kuzminov, leading expert at the ISSEK Foresight Centre.
According to joint WWF — IKEA research, the problem of diminishing primary forest areas with a high level of biodiversity, or forest areas highly important from environment protection point of view, remains quite relevant in Russia. At the same time, industrial reserves of softwood along key highways are depleting, while the share of less valuable varieties of wood in the overall national forest resources reserves is growing. Due to implementation of infrastructural, mining, and forest industry projects, people in certain Russian regions find it increasingly difficult to carry on with traditional forest-based economic activities (such as gathering mushrooms, berries, medicinal herbs, and hunting).
The above problems necessitate adoption of an integrated approach to managing taiga (boreal) forests, which make the bulk of all Russian forests and, together with Canadian and Scandinavian forests, form the boreal belt — the planet’s “lungs” — which makes a major contribution to maintaining climate stability (by absorbing greenhouse gases), preserving biodiversity, and protecting water resources.
To use forests more efficiently, and to preserve the still mostly intact wooded areas, the Russian Government set the objective of switching to intensive forestry model — i.e. the model of timber harvesting management when timber is harvested in the same area for a long time without allowing any unwanted changes of wood varieties, and with accelerated reforestation. The Boreal Wood Platform established by the WWF initiative will serve as a board for discussing ways to move on to the new forest management technique.
The first meeting of the platform was attended by representatives of environmental organisations, businesses, research community and public authorities, to outline strategic objectives for the new discussion board. The experts recruited into the platform will evaluate the existing and newly proposed forestry-related legislation, summarise research results, and promote voluntary forest certification (a specialised forest protection mechanism which implies evaluation of all forestry-related activities by an independent party, on the basis of environmental, social, and economic standards). This work has the following long-term objectives: 1) developing the resource base for timber processing; 2) increasing the industry’s competitiveness and the companies’ efficiency; 3) creating conditions for long-term investments in development of forestry and forest industry.
Ilya Kuzminov, leading expert of ISSEK who participated in the inaugural session of the Boreal Wood Platform, noted another important objective for the expert community: strategic planning and setting long-term technological priorities for the forest sector development. In particular, this is due to the fact that the Federal Agency for Forestry plans to adopt a new Forest Complex Development Strategy Until 2025. The newly created platform could serve as a source of expert knowledge for developing this strategy. The Boreal Wood Platform can potentially participate in conducting foresight studies of S&T and innovation-based development of the forest sector in the framework of the national S&T foresight system, which is currently being set up in accordance with the presidential decrees issued in May. The platform could also cooperate with the HSE Foresight Centre.
The meeting participants agreed to adopt the Boreal Wood Platform Declaration in the near future, specifying the platform’s functions and its key partners.
By Andrei Kucherov