The State Forestry Agency has proposed an experiment – to transfer self-sown forests to private management
Ukraine is considering the possibility of introducing private forestry, but not at the expense of the state forest fund, but on self-reforested territories. Viktor Smal, head of the State Agency of Forest Resources of Ukraine, told this in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine .
According to him, the issue of private forests has a historical context. He cited the example of Latvia, which, after the collapse of the USSR, conducted a thorough study on the forests' belonging to collectivization.
"You could petition the state and local authorities and say that my grandmother lived here, this was her forest. As a result, they have a huge number of forestry users: if I remember the number correctly, there are 115,000 forest users in Latvia, with an average plot size of 3 hectares," Smal explained .
However, the head of the agency believes that the introduction of private forests may be premature for Ukraine.
"I think it may be a little premature for our society, because after the Soviet Union we received a tangible influence of its philosophy, which can often manifest itself in the fact that now I will do something here, and after me, even the forest will not grow!" Smal said.
According to him, giving the forest into private hands means entrusting the use of the resource for decades. A big temptation for a new user is not to comply with the requirements of the current legislation and quickly "manage".
"We could move towards pilots, and I would welcome it in every way, if we started talking about private forests not from the state forest fund, but from self-reforested areas," Smal emphasized .
He outlined five possible scenarios for self-forested territories:
- inaction, which is the worst option;
- ruin and transformation into an agricultural fund;
- transfer to a state forest user;
- creation of a municipal enterprise;
- experiment when the owner of the land where the forest grew gets the right to manage it.
- on October 14, the head of the State Forestry Agency said that in the Carpathians, they plan to completely abandon clear-cutting for primary use starting in 2027. Instead, new methods will be introduced.
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