International Day of Forests. Towards sustainable forest management

To mark the International Day of Forests (IDF) celebrated annually since 2013 in accordance with the decision of the UN General Assembly, a joint press conference was held at the Moscow UN House, co-organized by the Russian Federal Agency for Forestry (Rosleskhoz) and the FAO Liaison Office with the Russian Federation. 

The theme of this year's IDF was “Forests and Biodiversity. Too precious to lose.”

“Forests render valuable ecosystem services for humans, providing air and water purification, capturing and stocking carbon dioxide, helping to produce food, various wood and paper products,” said Oleg Kobiakov, Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the Russian Federation, in his opening remarks. “Forests are essential for the functioning of major watersheds and have a profound impact on the global climate and rainfall patterns. Moreover, forests were and remain the most important part of the civilizational heritage, an integral element of culture, folklore and everyday life of the peoples of the planet.” 

“Biodiversity is in great danger due to deforestation, forest degradation due to anthropogenic and natural factors,” said Oleg Kobiakov, who moderated this meeting of experts, practitioners, scientists and journalists. “Sustainable forest management and forest restoration is vital for people, biodiversity and mitigating climate change.”

For Russia, the issue of forest conservation is of particular importance. “Forest ecosystems are home to 80% of Russia's plant and animal species. At the same time, almost a third of the population lives in rural areas, and the welfare and quality of life of these people depend on forests,” Mikhail Klinov, Deputy Head of the Federal Agency for Forestry, said in his detailed presentation.

The state program “Development of forestry” has been adopted. А number of key projects are being implemented in Russia: such as “Conservation of forests” and “Conservation of biological diversity and development of eco-tourism”. For example, the project “Conservation of forests” involves the preservation of woodlands, including on the basis of their reproduction in all areas of felled and dead forest stands.

The Agency plans for the current year, in particular, to create a reserve of seeds of forest plants for reforestation and afforestation, to replenish the stock of forestry equipment and machinery, as well as the park of forest fire vehicles and technique.

As part of the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goal “Life on Land” (SDG-15), Mikhail Klinov noted, Russia has increased the area of reforestation: in 2019, this area exceeded 1 million hectares, and 74 parkland green belts were created in 54 regions with a total area spanning more than 1.3 million hectares.

“The main goal of forestry development today is to ensure sustainable, rational, continuous, multi-purpose forest management, and to preserve its biological diversity. Full implementation of the Federal project “Conservation of forests” will help to achieve this goal,” Mikhail Klinov emphasized.

The activities of the Federal Agency for Forestry follow the principle of “sustainable forest management”, as the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said in his message on the occasion of the IDF, Vladimir Kuznetsov, Director of the UN Information center in Moscow, pointed out in his speech.

Presenting key messages in A. Guterres' address, he highlighted the climate-saving function of forests, which act as important carbon absorber capturing about 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide annually.

If we contain the process of deforestation and improve forest management and reforestation, we can achieve the goal set in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – to keep the global average temperature increase to less than 1.5 degrees, said Vladimir Moshkalo, Head of the Russian office of the UN Environment Programme.

“Forests help capture carbon dioxide. For example, the Russian taiga absorbs 15% of the planet's total carbon dioxide emissions. According to the World Wildlife Fund, if you do not take care of the conservation and restoration of forests today, by 2050, the planet will no more boast of untouched virgin forests. Every year, about 12 million hectares of forest are destroyed, which approximately equals the area of England,” said Vladimir Moshkalo. 

“Deforestation is responsible for approximately 12-18% of global carbon emissions, which is almost equal to the amount of CO₂emitted by all types of transport.”

Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Pavel Krasilnikov, Deputy Director of the Eurasian Center for food security at Lomonosov Moscow state University, detailed the role of forest soils in providing plant and animal biodiversity of forest ecosystems, productive functions of forests and their impact on human production activities in the forest industry.

The event was broadcast in the videoconference format. Mikhail Drapalyuk, Rector of Voronezh State University of Forestry and Technologies, going live, shared his vision on the sectoral problems and ways to solve them. Yevgeny Platonov, Rector of the Ural State Forest Engineering University, then upheld the discussion. 

In conclusion, the panellists answered questions from journalists.

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You are welcome to watch the report on IDF event made and broadcast by TV BRICS: 

https://tvbrics.com/shows/mezhdunarodnyy-den-lesov/?sphrase_id=6857