Last week, the State Bureau of Investigations (SBI) reported three suspicions to foresters regarding illegal logging, which caused the state losses amounting to UAH 67.2 million.
Information about the exposed schemes was published on the official website of the agency.
The SBI found significant violations of current forest management rules in Zakarpattia, Rivne, and Volyn regions.
Among other things, at the end of July, they uncovered a scheme organized by the former director of the Carpathian National Nature Park and the director of a private company. They forged documents about the alleged development of technical documentation on land management for the national park. Under this pretext, they stole UAH 5.3 million from the state.
Thanks to the SBI investigation, the suspects have already compensated for these losses in full.
Photo: dbr.gov.ua.
Last week, the agency also reported on the exposure of a large-scale scheme of illegal changes in the electronic timber accounting system (EOD) throughout Ukraine. It was used by employees of the state-owned enterprise “Forests of Ukraine” throughout the country, and its organizer received more than UAH 10 million in bribes for his “services.” From 2021 to September 2024, there were over 10,000 illegal interventions in the EOD.
Every week, EcoPolitics reports on the exposure of dishonest employees of the State Enterprise “Forests of Ukraine” in its digests. These can be both ordinary foresters and top officials in the industry. For example, on July 21, the State Bureau of Investigation announced that it suspected Yuriy Bolokhovets, the CEO of the state-owned enterprise “Forests of Ukraine,” of illegal enrichment. The next day, it became known that the court had remanded him in custody with bail set at almost 91 million hryvnias.
