Ecologists vow to protect Arkhangelsk virgin forest
Anna Ushakova with AETAS and Trude Myhre from WWF urge protection of the last large areas with old-growth forest in Europe.
Although 80 percent of Arkhangelsk Oblast is covered with forest, the unique ecological features of the primary forest with a biodiversity found nowhere are dramatically declining.
“We have little left of the old virgin forest. Luckily enough are some areas still without forest roads, making it difficult for large timber harvesters to reach,” says Anna Ushakova with AETAS, a local environmental group based in Arkhangelsk.
Together with environmentalists from Norway, Anna Ushakova last week gathered some 90 youths in Arkhangelsk, establishing a forum to gain increased attention to the vulnerable old-growth forest.
“It was shocking to see how much of the forest in the Arkhangelsk region that have disappeared over the last 50 years. I really hope AETAS and other environmental groups manage to get protection of the last virgin forest before it gets destroyed by logging companies,” says Ane Margrethe Ugelvik with the local branch of Nature and Youth in Troms and Finnmark in northern Norway.
Nature and Youth has for two decades facilitated for cross-border environmental contacts with AETAS in Arkhangelsk and Murmansk-based Priroda i Molodezh (PiM).
“The forest and the spices living there don’t care much about artificial, human-made borders, therefore it is so important that countries cooperate across borders,” says Oskar Njaa with Nature and Youth.
Supported by the Norwegian Barents Secretariat, Nature and Youth and WWF-Norway, have initiated a forest protection project with AETAS in Arkhangelsk.
Trude Myhre with WWF-Norway says the environmentalists in Arkhangelsk can use the same methods as with success were used in Norway some years ago.
“By creating international attention on virgin forest protection, the paper industry in Europe got a pressure from the market not to use timber from controversial old-growth forest logging,” says Trude Myhre.
In Arkhangelsk region, protection areas for old-growth forest are found on the border to Karelia, on the Onega Peninsula and in the Pinega district.
The largest areas with old-growth forest, still unprotected, are found along the Mezen river system.
