TO PAY MEANS TO PAY, TO SHOOT MEANS TO SHOOT
The article by Alexander OCHERETNIY,
Published in "Belorusskaya Gazeta" (The Byelorussian newspaper) Newspaper, No 48,
December 06, 2004
We again heard the word "to shake up" said by our president on TV. This word is often used to make anecdotes about the present authority. This case to be "shaken up" concerns the work of hunting enterprises.
The president charged the government to develop the draft normative and legal documents on the ordering the system of the state management and the control of the hunting enterprises' work up to the end of December.
THE PRESIDENT IS AGAIN RIGHT
The president was completely right when he said that the fauna is the national legacy. He was also right when he said about the domination of poaching in the country's hunting enterprises. He was very right when he said that each second poacher is a high-ranked local official and quite often a high-ranked militia officer. The huntsmen and hunt managers from the Uzdenskoe hunting enterprise and Belovezhskaya Pushcha just helplessly spread one's hands during the discussion of this problem: what we can do?
The president said that "it is necessary to pay much money to get the right for hunting and to obtain the license for shooting the wild animals because it is very expensive pleasure...". He continued that this business sphere should become an exclusive sport and rest instead of the means of the meal production.
WHO IS THE TARGET?
Let's start our analysis from the following point: the present form of hunting has been never considered by anyone as the means of the subsistence, except those poachers who have been mentioned above and who had much lower rank - rural inhabitants setting up the loop-traps at the hare and roe deer paths.
Secondly, an ordinary Belarusian hunter pays for this hobby while he becomes a member of the hunting society as well as the annual member payment and the annual state tax are under obligation. We don't mention here the cost of expensive equipment, weapon and ammunition. Besides of this a hunter bays the permit and the license to hunt the ungulates or capercailzies (this is the only bird species in Belarus which is hunted under the license) in some hunting enterprise. After a hunter bought the permit (for one hunt or for the whole season) he does not get the right to shoot all life that is moving. There is a concept of the "hunting norm" which is different in the hunting enterprises. To hunt more the game than it is specified in the permit is equated with poaching and is punished by the penalty.
The repeated many times phrase "many hunting enterprises are unprofitable", to all appearances, made the main sense of the angry speech of the president. It means we have to take the high coefficient of "for" supported the average Belarusian official, then we multiply "are unprofitable", add an "exclusive sport and rest" and make conclusions. It is reasonable to assume that the average Belarusian hunter (the real but not the exclusive) can put his gun on a shelf now: his hunting is finished. Most likely he will not be able to pay for this exotic hobby in the future.
EACH BULLET IS TO BRING THE INCOME
The president referred the practice of unnamed "other countries" where the hunting brings the income to the state. African countries with the advanced system of safari are the most known of them. Almost all European countries are specialized to receipt the foreign hunters. Mongolia, Canada and USA also became lately active to invite foreigners with guns. There are different forms of the hunting business in these countries.
In EU, for example there is no differentiation between the native and foreign hunters because all huntings are taken place in the grounds owned by somebody. The principle is the one - pay and shot. The level of income of the ordinary Swiss or French can allow him to hunt a chamois or moufflon three times per year. If to compare, the level of income of the average Swiss is nearly the same as of the very reach Belarusian who can allow himself the hunting in the Alps few times per year.
The situation in the African countries is theoretically the similar - "pay and shoot". However, taking into account the fact that the locals spend no more than $ 1 per day for vital daily needs, only a reach visitant coming from the other continent can allow himself the hunting in Africa. This results a wild outburst of poaching in savanna and jungle and the permanent wars between raingears who guard the native national parks and poachers with Kalashnikov submachine-guns.
The situation in USA, Canada and some European countries is different. All hunters are divided into the natives, visitants and foreigners. The natives (representatives of indigenous nationalities) are supplied the free-of-charge annual licenses for hunting the certain animals like grizzly which can de sold to everyone for any price. Locals (inhabitants of the state) can bay the same licenses by the accessible price while the hunting for the visitants is expensive. As to the foreign fans (amateurs) of the hunt, they pay very much. Almost all money gained from the hunters goes to finance the nature protection programs: the diversity of fauna and the national parks' infrastructure is supported by tourists and hunters.
So, the appeal of the president to make the profitable hunting enterprises can mean only one - abrupt increasing of prices to the level which is inaccessible for the average Belarusian.
Alexander Lukashenko declared that the unprofitable hunting enterprises will be put for sale. The private owners can also be purchasers. But there is misunderstanding: according to the hunting rules accepted in our country, hunting lands cover all areas with the exception of built-up areas, recreational zones, sanitary belt areas around the cities and garden grounds. Hunting enterprises include woods, bogs, reservoirs, arable lands . Summarizing, the other is next to nothing. Are theses forbidden for sale lands really sold up already?
"ONLY MONGRELS REMAINED"
The president mentioned the National Park "Belovezhskaya Pushcha" and Pripyatski National Park as the positive examples. It is the true fact that Belovezhskaya Pushcha was indeed some kind of polygon for "running in" of different approaches to work with foreign hunters over last ten years. Below are prices for hunting of animals with the different trophy quality (the price verity depends on the trophy quality of antlers or tusks; prices are in Euro): red deer - from 300 to 2,000, elk - from 450 to 1,000, roe deer - from 50 to 200 and wild boar - from 200 to 600. Foreigners also hunt bison, however prices for the patriarch of Belarusian woods got to use secret for us.
This "good practice" is hardly well, especially if to take into account the basic purpose of Belovezhskaya Pushcha - nature protection and scientific investigations. Valery Dranchuk, author of the book "Belovezhskaya Pushcha. Resolution SOS. The chronicle of the beauty and struggle" and main editor of the newspaper "Belovezhskaya Pushcha", and huntsmen from this forest who wished to be unnamed believe that Belovezhskaya Pushcha is on the verge of destruction now. Commercial huntings are one of the main reasons of it. The elite gene found of ungulates is lost after these huntings. The males in the prime of life become targets for hunters first of all because they have the most advanced antlers or tusks.
Concerning the bison hunting, disputes were held for a long time. All agreed that only old and diseased animals can be object for hunting because the bison herd in Belovezhskaya Pushcha suffers from the serious epizootic affected the male sexual organs while the diseased animals are rather numerous and just males with high trophy quality are the most often carriers of this disease.
However, according to Mr Dranchuk, foreign hunters shoot not only ill animals. It is no problem to get the permission for "selective" shoot from the "down" administrative level namely from a guiding huntsman personally paying him, so-called "black business".
The author of the book said that the fans of the hunting have exterminated the wild boar in Belovezhskaya Pushcha at all since the Soviet times. Please, accept right understanding: there are a lot of pigs while wild boars are almost lost. Only mongrels, fruits of the love between wild boars and home pigs which nave been specially put under the soot of the party bosses remained. The author of this text could personally witness a skin of such the animal in the house of one of huntsmen. It is looking like the wild boar's skin but has white spots. To make the entire picture it is necessary to remind that the operative sawmill is located literally five hundred meters from the administrative centre of the National Park, the village of Kamenyuki. The mention of it is the supplement to the question about the wild nature protection.