In the Milatsk community in Rivne region, environmental inspectors counted more than 4,000 stumps of illegally felled trees on a plot of land that the Rivne Regional State Administration transferred to the State Enterprise "Forests of Ukraine" in early November.
This was reported by the State Environmental Inspection (SEI) of the Polissya district.
A commission consisting of environmental inspectors, foresters, representatives of executive authorities, and local self-government bodies surveyed forestry land plots covering an area of approximately 611 hectares in the territory of the Miliacka village council in the Sarny district. In addition to unauthorized logging, the inspectors also found littering on an area of about 0.1 hectares.
The Environmental Inspectorate reminded that Part 2 of Article 107 of the Forest Code of Ukraine obliges local self-government authorities to compensate for damage caused to the forest if the responsible individuals are not identified and if the forest is not under the management of a permanent forest user.
“To avoid significant financial losses, fines, and legal proceedings, communities can transfer their forests to permanent forest users. This procedure does not require budget expenditures and typically takes up to three months,” stated Yevhenii Medvedovskyi, Head of the SEI Polissia District.
At the beginning of December, EcoPolitic reported on the challenges of protecting self-seeded and ownerless forests. According to experts, there are hundreds of thousands of hectares of existing forested areas in Ukraine that simply need to be added to the fund and protected.
