Libmonster ID: RU-17256
Автор(ы) публикации: Alexander CHIBILEV

by Alexander CHIBILEV, RAS Corresponding Member, Vice-President of the Russian Geographical Society (RGS), Director of the Steppe Institute, RAS Ural Branch (Orenburg), Chairman of the RGS Standing Nature Conservation Commission

Over the past three years the Russian Geographical Society has done much to revive its old traditions. At its 13th and 14th congresses in 2009 and 2010 and also at meetings of its Academic and Guardianship Boards the focus was on its role in the exploration and conservation of the environmental and historico-cultural heritage of our country. It was also decided to re-establish the RGS Standing Nature Conservation Commission; this decision concurred with the RGS centennial.

BACKGROUND OF THE CONSERVATION MOVEMENT

Originating in Russia at the end of the 19th century, this movement gathered momentum in the first decades of the 20th century. It was a public crusade in support of natural monuments led by such great minds as botanist Ivan Borodin (1847-1930); anthropologist and geographer Dmitry Anuchin (1843-1923); arboriculturist, geographer and botanist Georgi Morozov (1867-1920); St. Petersburg zoologist and member of the Sayan expedition Dmitry Solovyov (1886-1931); head of the Zoology Chair at Lomonosov Moscow State University Gri-gori Kozhevnikov (1866-1933); botanist and geographer of Kharkov University Valery Taliev (1872-1932); geog-

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rapher Veniamin Semyonov-Tien-Shansky (1870-1942) and his brother, enthomologist Andrei Semyonov-Tien-Shansky (1866-1942), among others.

For the first time an ethical and aesthetical approach to wildlife protection and reservation management was developed. It came in the wake of an idea voiced by the famous soil scientist Vasily Dokuchaev in 1892 in favor of special protected reservations or wildlife sanctuaries. In contrast to the national parks of the USA set apart for hunting, fishing, entertainment and leisure activities, Dokuchaev proposed to establish wildlife preserves exclusively for the intact native flora and fauna. This idea was furthered by natural scientists whom we can rightly call "a mighty cohort of preserve management".

Today we ought to pay tribute to these notable members of the Russian Geographical Society who pioneered in this important cause. Their ideas are even more topical today, in the 21st century.

NATURE CONSERVATION PLANS

Ivan Borodin, member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences and afterwards of USSR Academy of Sciences (who founded and headed the Russian Botanical Society in 1915) stressed in his report "Conservation of Natural Monuments" (1910) that H.M. Russian Geographical Society with its ramified branches in all provinces, even remote ones, had a great opportunity to set up a "Central Nature Conservation Committee that could include representatives of different authorities concerned". The RGS board endorsed Regulations for the proposed Standing Nature Conservation Commission.

In 1909 Grigori Kozhevnikov, in his paper "On Organization of Preserved Areas of Russian Nature", underscored the need of wildlife sanctuaries. Georgi Morozov, author of the theory on forestland as a geographical and historical phenomenon, cooperated with the Commission and proposed that the most valuable forest standards should be conserved in different regions. We should also mention the two Semyonov-Tien-Shansky brothers, the famous naturalists. Andrei Semyonov-Tien-Shansky, President of the Russian Enthomological Society, was one of the most ardent champions of wildlife significant per se. Said he, "Nature needs freedom the same way as people do." Natural preserves should give such freedom. Veniamin Semyonov-Tien-Shansky, the founder and editor of the multivolume edition: Russia. Complete Geographical Description of Our Motherland was also active in the Nature Conservation Commission; he summed up proposals of its members in October of 1917 in his report " On Types of Localities Where Natural Reserves Similar to the American National Parks Should Be Established". The report was supplemented with the map of the Northern Hemisphere indicating the existing US national parks and 46 analogs to be created in Russia. He used a purely geographical approach in locating such conservation areas.

DEVELOPMENT STAGES IN 1918 THROUGH 2000

In 1918 the Nature Conservation Commission of the Russian Geographical Society went out of existence. But many of its members kept, as far as it was

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possible, trying to enlist the country's new government to their cause.

In general, the 20th century saw a jumble of contradictory decisions in nature preservation. There were milestone events in this respect.

Here are some of them: the year 1898-a private nature preserve, set up at Askaniya-Nova (Kherson Region, Ukraine); 1916-the first Barguzin nature preserve established at Lake Baikal; 1917-the first project of the Russian conservation system advanced by Veniamin Semy-onov-Tien-Shansky; 1922-the memorandum of Grigori Kozhevnikov "On the Needs of Russian Nature Preservation" got support from the government and the Academy of Sciences; 1930-purges in the Chief Directorate of Scientific Institutions accompanied by dismissals and reprisals of eminent naturalists; 1933-the First All-Russia nature preservation congress; 1930-1940-42 new nature preserves set up countrywide; 1951-closure of 88 natural preserves and contraction of the remaining 20 preserves, their total area decreasing more than tenfold; 1960-the overall number of nature preserves reached 85; adoption of the law "On Nature Preservation in Russia"; 1961-sixteen forest preserves closed and opened for logging; their area reduced twofold; 1962-"Regulations for State Natural Preserves" adopted, their status as research institutions re-established; 1980s-the number of natural preserves in the USSR reaching 200; the first national parks set up; 1988-the Union (USSR) Ministry of the Environment instituted, followed by the same body for the Russian Federation; 2000-abolition of the State Committee for Environmental Conservation in charge of all nature preserves; 2012-the RGS Standing Nature Conservation Commission re-established.

NEW TASKS

Today our Commission has to seek a solution to the following problems: whether all islands and islets of wildlife still there in Russia have a status of conservation territories; which objects in the list of the Nature Conservation Commission of 1917 should be awarded this status. It is common knowledge that the status of conservation territories depends on their geographical location, lack of economic interest, and transport inaccessibility. That is why protected wildlife islands are very randomly distributed territorially. There are as good as no nature preserves in the main agricultural belt. The existing ones take in a negligibly small area of steppe and forest landscapes whose special value was stressed by Vasily Dokuchaev, Ivan Borodin, Veniamin Semyonov-Tien-Shansky and other naturalists.

Specially protected natural areas as envisaged in the list prepared in 1917 by the Standing Nature Conservation Commission of H.M. Russian Geographical Society have not been created thus far, namely at Khibini*;

* Khibini, the largest mountain area in the Kola Peninsula.-Ed.

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the Mid-Russian Upland; in Baraba*, and in Ural Urema**. Many wildlife refuges are not within the initially prescribed boundaries.

PROTECTION OF EXOTIC SPECIES

Now habitats of exotic biological species still are not protected environmentally. I would like point at three types of the Russian fauna covering the aquatic, air and terrestrial environments.

The first and most significant type is represented by the Russian sturgeon, most valuable to us, and other species migratory in the basins of the Black and Caspian seas, and nonmigratory (local) found in Siberian rivers. It should be noted that despite headway made in sturgeon cultivation, a catastrophic decline (20-40 fold drop) has taken place in the natural population of the Russian sturgeon, great sturgeon and barbel sturgeon in the Caspian Sea basin. We can save the largest natural sturgeon population in the North Caspian region only by changing the conservation status of the cross boundary river Ural and other waterways of the Caspian Sea basin.

Among the many exotic species of the bird fauna I should like to name a red-breasted goose as endemic*** (home) to Russia and Eurasia. The responsibility for preservation of this species rests entirely with our country, from the Arctic tundra down to the Northern Cauca-

* Baraba, a forest-steppe land in the interfluve of the rivers Ob and trtysh.-Ed.

** Ural Urema, part of the valley of the Ural below the influx of its left tributary.-Ed.

*** Endemics (from the Greek, "local"), biological taxa whose representatives inhabit a relatively restricted area.-Ed.

sia, its migration paths including. To protect this waterfowl it is necessary to create a cluster (combined according to particular characteristics) wildlife preserve taking in the habitat of this species on the Taimyr Peninsula, swamps of Western Siberia, steppe lakes east of the Urals and wetlands of the Northern Caucasia.

Tarpan (Equus cabullus gmelini) or the wild horse is another title species of the extinct Russian fauna. Therefore, the project of Przewalsky's horse reintroduction* was supported by a RGS grant. Today all through the steppeland belt of Eurasia from Hungary in the west to Mongolia and China in the east only our country has failed to start the reintroduction procedure in her steppes. In the Orenburg Region, 16.5 thous. ha area has been set apart for settlement of wild horses; however, action on this project needs combined efforts of the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources, the Russian Geographical Society and the government of the Orenburg Region.

TOURISM AND NATURE PRESERVES

Harmonization of relations between environmental and recreational tourist activities is another crucial mission. Initially nature sanctuaries were not meant for tourism, unlike national parks designed, first of all, for organized recreation. Money-making activities in nature refuges are impermissible. Legalization of ecological tourism in the specially protected areas of national parks, let alone in nature preserves proper, is a violation of their regime.

* Reintroduction, resettlement of wild animals and plants of a definite species in once their homeland territory, where they disappeared for some reasons. Przewalsky horse, a wild horse (tarpan) subspecies native to Central Asia.-Ed.

стр. 52

Under the circumstances, high responsibility rests with the managers of nature preserves, that is they are obligated to protect wildlife standards of territories within their jurisdiction from human intervention, including scientific research and biotechnical measures.

The problem of integrating the federal and regional systems of specially protected areas into territorial socioeconomic development is a key aspect to be handled by our Commission anyway. In this regard, it should be realized that classical nature preserves should not justify their existence by economic interests alone because their everlasting value lies in their very existence-we get to know there are still patches of intact wildlife here on earth. The noncommercial value of these territories can be estimated only in theory because they have no value in much the same way as do unique treasures of world art, architecture or archeology.

Maintained by state or local authorities, sometimes by private owners, environmental heritage objects are part of the economic infrastructure of a particular region. Therefore, inviolable niches should be set aside in these territories, and they should be laid off in land tenure and regional plans so that no economic activity could be permitted there. Moreover, nature preserves and national parks especially can play an important role in regional economies. Apart from the tourist industry not affecting the undisturbed zones, they can evolve into basic nuclei for environmental clusters (nature preserves grouped according to their uniformity.-Ed.). Placement of nearby wildlife preserves, parks, natural monuments and other protected territories in their direct management would extend environmental culture to neighboring landscapes, it would create new protected areas of wildlife and provide for a reasonable transfer of part of the recreational and tourist load to landscapes other than specially protected areas.

RISKS AND DANGERS

Prevention of anthropogenic and natural-anthropogenic hazards inside and outside is yet another range of problems that our Commission has to address promptly.

The ecology of nature preserves is endangered by vol-untaristic decisions of administrative and economic bodies, by plunder and poaching, by violation of reservation conditions and use of natural preservations and national parks for hunting and research purposes. Fires are still another lasting threat. The same hazards hold for wildlife areas and unique landscapes not under special state protection as yet.

Thus, last year our Nature Conservation Commission had to deal with real threats posed by new methods of phosphate extraction in the territory of a planned national park in the Khibini Mountains. Specialists have already filed proposals on setting up a Transpolar-Ural national park in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District and also a Subpolar-Ural national park in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous District.

In the autumn of 2011, as advised by our Commission, President of the Russian Geographical Society Sergei Shoygu took action to stop the plunder of the New Siberian Islands paleontological heritage. The RGS field party worked there in 2012 and prepared proposals on establishing a national park on these islands.

LESSONS OF HISTORY, FATE OF THE BUZULUK PINE FOREST

The fact is that even the status of objects listed in the UNESCO world environmental heritage (today this list numbers ten* in Russia) does not protect them from

* This list includes the following objects: virgin forests of Komi, Lake Baikal, volcanoes of Kamchatka, Central Sikhote Alin, Golden Mountains of Altai, Western Caucasia, Wrangel Island, Putorana Plateau, Lena Pillars, Ubsu Nur syncline.-Ed.

стр. 53

technogenic threats. For example, in "Lake Baikal"* there is illegal construction on the coast, and the Baikal integrated pulp-and-paper mill still at work; "Volcanoes of Kamchatka"** is the site of mineral exploration and prospecting, up to boundary changes; "Western Caucasia"-no protection status of the buffer zone, economic development projects; "Golden Mountains of Altai"- pipeline construction plans; "Virgin forests of Komi"- mineral extraction projects, and so forth.

The Buzuluk pine forest*** is an eloquent example of anthropogenic hazards of the 20th and early 21st centuries. This unique woodland, the world's largest pine forest bounded by steppes, became a school of the national forest science and forest biogeocenology**** in the 19th-early 20th centuries. Here the forester Georgi Morozov and Academician Vladimir Sukachev (1880-1967) developed a theory of forest stands and their types; in 1917 Veniamin Semyonov-Tien-Shansky included it into the project of the Nature Conservation Commission

See: M. Kuzmin, G. Khursevich, "Diatom Chronicle of Lake Baikal and Climatic Change", Science in Russia, No. 3, 2012; M. Khalizeva. "Benthal Routes of 'MIRs'", Science in Russia, No. 2, 2009; V. Dobrynin, "Why Baikal Aglow?", Science in Russia, No. 2, 2013.-Ed.

** See: G. Karpov, "Kamchatka, a Unique Region", Science in Russia, No. 6, 2010; V. Znamensky, "One of a Kind", Science in Russia, No. 4, 2000; Olga Borisova, "Kudryavy Volcano", Science in Russia, No. 6, 2005; "Energy of Volcanoes", Science in Russia, No. 1, 2006; "Tragedy in the Valley of Geysers", Science in Russia, No. 6, 2007.-Ed.

*** Buzuluk pine forest is an isolated land mainly of a pine forest on the border of the Samara and Orenburg regions of Russia. Its area is 1,067.88 km2.-Ed.

**** Biogeocenology, a science at the junction of biology (ecology) and geography, investigating the structure and functions of biogeocenosis. It represents a comprehensive level of natural studies.-Ed.

as one of Russia's 46 national parks. However, the fate of this pine forest is both tragic and instructive. Over the last two centuries up to 75 percent of its territory was consumed by fire. The fires of 1831, 1879 and 1921 were especially devastating.

In 1932 a national nature preserve was created in one part of this pine forest. Yet its activity was criticized and in 1948 it was closed down. A period of large-scale reforestation was ushered in. As a result, about 30,000 ha (75,000 a.) was planted with unviable forest cultures. In 1959 deep-hole oil-and-gas prospecting and drilling started. Low standards of oil and gas production led to mass oil spillages and ignition. Under the pressure of the scientific community the first ban on oil and gas production there was announced in 1973. However, the oilmen left behind a pipeline network, industrial waste, abandoned and plugged wells, all this posing a technogenic danger.

In 1994 by government decision the Buzuluk pine forest was entered in the list of national nature preserves and parks to be established in Russia in 1994 through 2005. And only in 2007 this pine forest became a national natural park at long last. But this status did not put an end to its troubles. The oil and gas wells were not rendered harmless. Fires were still a threat. Back in the years of the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945) the weapon arsenal was brought to the heart of the forest by a railroad track built for the purpose. In June of 2012 this arsenal came alive as artillery shells, detonating were scattered over several kilometers.

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Our Commission is also looking into the problem of developing new categories of protected territories, covering the landscape and biological diversity of the country.

As early as 1918 a member of the Nature Conservation Commission, zoologist Dmitry Solovyov, suggested in his work Types of Organizations Promoting Nature Conservation more than 30 forms of protection for environmental conservation objects. Unfortunately they found no application in Russia. But there are scores of such forms in the USA, Canada, Great Britain and other countries. Thus, in Canada 3,000 km long 13 rivers all told got the "national river" environmental status. In 1993 a special law in the USA protected 153 river areas 18,000 km long in all. Worldwide protected nature conservation clusters of the linear (migratory) and group types are common practice. The environmental regime may also be of seasonal nature. Certain types of protective nature management, such as cattle ranging that spares hay harvest, can be used for biodiversity conservation (particular plant and animal species). But these methods are not quite good for classical nature preserves and the quiescence zones of national parks.

We are also dealing with the cult of pristine landscapes and wildlife as the public domain of all peoples.

It would be nice if the Park of Russia project announced at a meeting of the RGS Guardianship Board in August of 2012 included the best objects of the country's unique landscapes and wildlife. We believe that pristine nature areas shall be one of the central symbols of our country and her peoples.

Our working team has prepared, in cooperation with the RGS Administrative Council and the office of the RGS Executive Managerial Board, all essential documents for setting up a Standing Nature Conservation Commission within the Russian Geographical Soceity. We approved the Charter of the Commission and Regulations for an Academician Ivan Borodin Gold Medal "For Services in the Conservation of the Environmental Heritage of Russia". This medal is ready. In September of 2012 at a full-scale meeting of the Commission in Orenburg this medal was awarded to RAS Corresponding Member Gennady Rosenberg and professor Arkady Tishkov.

It is our sincere desire for this award to be a token of our memory, and respect for the history of the preservation movement in Russia. We hope it will help restore the natural linkage of time, now out of joint, and the venerable traditions of the Russian Geographical Society.

Modern information technologies, remote control and high traveling speeds furnish new opportunities for nature studies. I see the humanitarian role of our Commission in that we are awake to our responsibility for the future of pristine landscapes and their inhabitants. We feel, hear, see, understand and value whatever relates to the environmental heritage of the nation.


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