SOS from the Belovezhskaya Pushcha
The article by Lilia Khlystun,
Published in «Sovetskaya Byelorussiya» (The Soviet Byelorussia) Newspaper, #25,
January 26, 2002
Recently passions are raging around the Belovezhskaya Pushcha National Park. Some nervous newspapers from Minsk, the capital of Belarus, and the politicians who only care about self promotion interpret sanitary clear cuttings of trees that have been affected by the mass population of bark beetle in the reserve as the «felling of the living forest». Situation is turning to the worse day after day. Last week the team of scientists, writers and public figures appealed to the Council of Europe to delay the extension of the Diploma granted to the Belovezhskaya Pushcha by this international organization before. It is common knowledge that the European Council has hearings regarding questions of this nature on Monday.
Yesterday the «SB» editorial office received a letter signed by the Deputy Manager of the Property Management Department of the President Mr. V. Sudas. He writes: «…the extreme dry weather conditions of 1992 — 1994 and 2000 — 2001, the mature age of spruce forests (140 years old) promoted the active population of forest pests including bark beetles, that have caused the damage and destruction of forests in large areas of the country including the Belovezhskaya Pushcha National Park. Analysis of the situation in this protected natural institution was conducted by highly skilled scientist as well as experts from other ministries, departments and institutions. During the period of June to October of 2001, more than 300 bark beetle infection sites have been discovered. The total volume of the damaged wood is more than 60 thousand cubic meters. What is being considered in this package are measures for the struggle against pests (the pheromone traps setting, the wood trap log putting, removing affected and dead trees). The government has agreed to give 35 million Roubles or 22.2 thousand US dollars in 2001 of additional funding to support these measures».
About month ago the author of this article saw evidence for herself of what was happening in the Belovezhskaya Pushcha. A team of 15 journalists from different mass-media outlets have visited the national park by invitation from the management. The Pushcha, which was included in the List of the World Heritage of Mankind 10 years ago and was granted a status of the Biosphere Reserve, is waiting for help. Debarked trunks and century old spruces whose needles have turned yellow the scope of the disaster is astronomical. Foresters are waiting for spring with horror because after the days begin to warm the invasion of the insidious beetle will continue. The major problem is that once the beetle has gotten under the bark, spruces become incurable. The only way the other tress in the forest can be saved is to remove the sick spruce from the forest as soon as possible. However, this process was not completed by spring. Unfortunately this was caused by heated debate in, as it happens sometimes, emotions have masked common sense. Felling was suspended and by autumn a number of affected sites has grown 10 fold.
Philosophy Doctor Adolf Korczik, the researcher from the department of natural forests of the Polish Forest Institute, when speaking to the correspondent from the «SB» Newspaper, did not bother to mask his perplexity with this situation. «Foresters in Poland are under the constant threat of being dismissed if they allow bark beetles to leave a tree. All infected trees in the forest part of the Pushcha should be cut even during spring».
Grigory Kravchuk, the economist of the national park with more than 40 years experience on the job is also anxious regarding the situation in the Pushcha. He was quoted saying, «… due to the termination of the cutting of new infected spruce trees a new generation of beetles have almost successfully finished their development and begun to settle in neighboring trees. This second generation has migrated into the forest letter for wintering, so when favorable weather conditions arrive again this year we will experience mass tree infections due to bark beetle.»
Perhaps, «representatives of the Belarusian public» do not know these professional details. Whether or not persons with particular titles by always reflect their competence? You must take into consideration there is not one expert-forester among them. By the way, one of the signed people is appeared on a text as the Professor Valentin Yatzuchno. Actually senior lecturer Valentin Yatzuchno asserts that he did not sign such the appeal.
Regarding myself and my journalist colleagues who have actually visited multiple sites of the Pushcha including the most reserved areas, I have been unable to discover any «industrial harvesting of living forest». Perhaps, it is due to the timber processing shop in the Kamenyuki village being situated outside the national park. The truth is the shop was always outside the park and specialized only in processing of «dead» trees. However, workers of the park now deliver infected and dead spruce trees there for the purpose of lowering the economic losses caused by pests.
The Belovezhskaya Pushcha is not only e Belarusian national property, but it is also an international one and it is in trouble. «We are reaching out to international organizations including the European Council and the World Bank, to possibly obtain the help required for solving the ecological problems», it is a text of the open letter to «SB». To rescue the famous forest — lungs of the continent, it is the business all over the Europe.