Residents of the village of Sadzhavka, Kolomyia district, Ivano-Frankivsk region, together with rangers, organized a vigil near the village of Ivanivtsi and recorded on video numerous timber trucks with untagged wood leaving the local forest.
This was reported by the online news resource “Podrobytsi”.
Petro and Bohdan Horichky showed the journalists fresh stumps. They said that before the war, there was no such scale of logging.
“At the moment, it's a shock to hear that there are no inspections, no one controls them, and this barbaric deforestation is going on uncontrollably,” says Bohdan Horichok.
The activists showed poles with markings indicating that the logging took place here in 2023. However, villagers find fresh stumps here. They are very concerned that many oak trees, which provide food for wild boars, have been cut down in the forest. Therefore, felling can lead to the animals leaving the area forever.
According to the men, the surveillance they organized for the loggers did have some effect – they started cutting less.
“We record every car, the arrival of these cars. We have a gamekeeper service, so there are a lot of people who are engaged in this and want to preserve these lands. We record them almost every day. Recently, they have suspended this felling for a while,” says Bohdan Horichok.
Meanwhile, in other places, trees are still being cut down, journalists say.
According to the documents provided by the head of Kolomyia superforestry, Andriy Smichyk, the oaks were cut down last year, and this year no work is being done on this site.
“We have not recorded any illegal logging there. This is the fifth time you have come to this forestry and these quarters, and we have already had an inspection by the USR (Office of Strategic Investigations – ed.), the Environmental Prosecutor's Office, and internal security on these particular logging operations. Nothing was found,” the head says.
However, local residents showed journalists documents on the opening of criminal proceedings. Also, concerned Ukrainians have managed to get a commission of the State Ecological Inspectorate to visit the superforestry in the near future, according to Podrobnitsy journalists.
Recently, EcoPolitic reported that in Zakarpattia, foresters cut down part of the virgin forest, which is inviolable under current law, to build a road.
