Evgeny SHVARTS: It is very important to show the role of Russia as an eco-system services supplier

In 2004 the World Wide Fund for Nature celebrated 10th anniversary of its work in Russia. During that time the Fund managed to enlarge the total area of protected areas more than by 25 per cent including those in Arctic region more than by 50 per cent and created over 50 protected areas in the area roughly equal to the territory of Germany. The bulletin “International Environmental Cooperation” presents to the readers an interview with Evgeny Shvarts, the Director of Conservation of WWF Russia.

“First of all let me congratulate Russian representative office of the World Wildlife Fund with the 10th working anniversary and the beginning of the WWF Russia activity as a national organization. What international projects out of those enforced in the territory of Russia during the latest 10 years you would call the most significant?”

“Practically all projects realized till the last year were international because they were subsidized by the foreign sources, mainly by the World Wildlife Fund national organizations and by the foreign development agencies of the governments of the developed countries — Denmark, Germany, the Great Britain, the Netherlands, the USA, Sweden and Switzerland.

In the first years, yet before the creation of the representative office WWF protected biodiversity in the traditional sense — financially supported preserves, national parks, financed the creation of new protected natural territories, created anti-poaching brigades, financed species programmes and especially financed the retraining of staff working in reserves and national parks.

During the first 2-3 years of our work we used to come first or second on the protected area support but in the middle of 1997 this support was decided to be reduced, not because the protected areas became less important for us but because we noted that the more we finance the reserves, the less, unfortunately, they are financed by the state. Only once we managed to use our funds as an “increasing effect”, when making an agreement with the government that we would guarantee 40 per cent financing of tiger protection programme we were lobbying, on the condition that the government would contribute another 40 per cent and that 20 per cent would be given by the subjects of the Federation where the tiger habitat was situated. This resulted in tiger population increase up to the 450 individuals, and our Russian tiger is now probably the safest tiger in the world.

That is why beginning from the year 1997 WWF decided that its task is, figuratively speaking, not in the feeding of the hungry men with fish but in giving of the fishing-rods and teaching how to use them. We have begun to create management plans for the protected natural territories, teach to use these plans as an instrument for the fund rising. We are proud that the Lazovsky reserve in the south of the Far East has been paying more taxes in the latest years than receiving money from the state budget. It proves that the reserve is able to operate finances and spend them effectively, and we can't help being pleased by the fact because we used to finance the elaboration of the management plan approved in this reserve.

After the first five years of working we put our efforts not on “treating symptoms” of the environmental “diseases” but on penetration in the causes of the environmental problems. In this context the work on environmentally responsible Russian forest sector formation seems the most important to me from the viewpoint of system changes. It is doubtless not our personal merit, and this witnesses that we, on the one hand, have learned to interact with partners, and, on the other hand, to work straightly with forest business. This work includes creation of the so called “model forests”, the development of voluntary forest certification, illegal logging abatement, the switch of the large forest companies to the step-by-step policy. Our last achievement in this sphere is the creation of large forest production companies environmental responsibility ratings, jointly with the Russian rating “Expert RA” agency. So now our positions and the positions of major forest business are in many respects similar. We deal with questions of forest legislation both on regional and federal level frequently enough. In particular, having joined our efforts with other non-governmental organizations, we were able to achieve much in the matter of the new Forest Code ecologization.”

“You have mentioned the interaction with Russian colleagues from other environmental organizations. What are your views on the collaboration of this kind and in which cases do you consider it necessary?”

“We consider it very important that each partner retains his position and specificity, because in this case “biodiversity” is the guaranty of stability in our activity. We are not proponents of coalitions depriving us of the possibility to express our point of view, but sometimes unification of efforts is the only way to obtain the result. For example, the success in the fight for old-growth forest conservation was achieved after the four major players in the field — Socio-Ecological Union, Greenpeace, Biodiversity Conservation Centre and WWF — signed joint demands to the forest product traders from the part of the non-governmental organizations. The document became the corner-stone in the process of the forest sector ecologization because all Western business started to use it as a starting-point, the same concerned the investment into the Russian forest sector. Now we managed to sign a similar document addressed to the Russian oil and gas companies. This document might not have gained such popularity yet but the important point is that it was actually signed during three-four months while we searched for the common viewpoint with our companions concerning forests approximately a year and a half. In this sphere the chances for success also exist: recently “Sakhalin Energy” company announced that it would probably change the traces of subsurface oil-pipe lines which should have run on the feeding grounds of western grey whale population.”

“What international environmental agreements constitute the sphere of WWF Russia priority interests?”

“One of the most important for us is the programme connected with the fight for the Russia's Kyoto Protocol ratification where we work side by side with RREC. We are proud that our member Aleksandr Shestakov represents Russia and four other Eastern Europe countries in the Biodiversity Convention Bureau. Now he is re-elected for the next term — it is a unique case when a non-governmental organization representative protects the interests of Russia in the bureau of international organization. We actively work in the sphere of CITES Convention — our colleagues have often participated in the official governmental delegations, and under this Convention WWF is also accredited as an official observer. Besides, WWF is the official observer under the International Whaling Commission. We also participate in other events — UN Forest Forum, events within the framework of the Stockholm Convention on the Persistent Organic Pollutants. At that we try to avoid efforts scattering and to participate in the work of these international agreements only when it corresponds with our priorities.”

“In the middle of June the joint strategy of WWF Russia and WWF China forest programme activities was elaborated, general priority tasks were marked out. What are these tasks and how will their fulfillment help to the Far East forest business ecologization?”

“In fact it is a sensitive issue because practically all our success in the environmental activity was connected with the impact on the environmentally oriented consumer from Europe and Northern America. But the home market of China is environmentally inert. The volumes of Chinese forest production sales are known to be 2,5 billion dollars larger than those in Russia, and at that practically all these volumes are known to be the production of timber processing, timber, legally or illegally exported from Russia, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia and Burma. Considering that Chinese export grows by 25-40% per year, Chinese export represents the biggest threat to the forests. And taking into account that to the year 2010 market capacity of Asia and Pacific Ocean region will exceed the capacity of European markets, it is possible to state that those who deals with business ecologization and living nature protection in Russia are going to have difficult times. And with the help of the WWF China we expect to achieve the environmental responsibility standards of the transboundary forest trade supported by the state.”

“Tell us about the WWF Russia role in the WWF International Secretariate Central Asia Programme realization.”

“The management of the International Secretariate Central Asia Programme is enforced administratively from the WWF Russia. The Programme is currently in the stage of approving, but its priorities are obvious even now: those are the protection of waterfowl wintering and nesting places, rare species — kulan, Kopetdag leopard, cheetah whose population is planned to be restored. The projects related to the irrigated cropping, with the help of which we aspire to display that the problem is not in the lack of water but in its ineffective use, will be started in the nearest time. We are proud that this Programme coordinator Olga Pereladova is the only official observer under the Central Asia Commission on the Sustainable Development existing on ministerial level of the Central Asia states, and also by the fact that despite all political problems we manage to maintain good relations with the governments of almost all countries in the region.”

“Has recent meeting in Urumqi concerning the creation of the four-sided especially protected area bore any importance for the Altai and Sayan eco-region where WWF is actively working?”

“What concerns Altai and Sayan eco-region we try not to get circled in the protected area creation only, now it is far more important for us to study the argali migration in order to prevent their death on the frontier obstacles, to find the constructive ways of the conflict solution caused by the abaction between Tuva and Mongolia. At that we doubtless pay great attention to the development of system of the protected nature territories and their management training. In particular, representatives of the anti-poaching brigades from the south of the Russian Far East have come to the Mongolian national parks and taught the personnel to arrange the inspection work.

The dialog on the questions of the environmental protection in the eco-region moves on, and the joining of China to it is very important for us indeed, the thing that gradually occurs. Besides, within the framework of this process we managed to create two national reserves in Eastern Kazakhstan — it became a great success in itself, apart from that, the interaction mechanism of protected territories situated on the opposite sides of the border, was developed.”

“During 10 years of working WWF Russia has played a great role in the matter of Russian nature “presentation” in the West. Has the purposive work in this direction been performed, or has it become a positive “side effect” of the environmental activity?”

“It was surely included almost in every project of ours. If we are speaking about the work on the foreign money attraction for the environmental protection in Russia, it assumes popularization of things we have. For instance, when the governor of the Amur Region within the “Living Planet” campaign undertook the environmental protection obligations that are now actively performed, there was organized his visit to the Netherlands and the Great Britain and the meetings with the royalty which became a part of a big campaign on the Russian progress in the field of the environmental protection. The same concerned the visit of the Yakutia president to Sweden and Switzerland. It is very important to show the role of Russia as an eco-system services supplier, because if assess from the viewpoint of the species quantity only, the whole Russian tundra would be of less importance than any dump in Costa Rica. Another matter is that we use it as a kind of a double-edged weapon because in our opinion there exists no political process letting to include eco-system services of primeval nature of Russia into the international economic process aside from the Kyoto Protocol frames. The fact that within the framework of the Protocol Russia managed to provide the essential part of forest restoration quotas proves that we can effectively strive for other service compensation. At that energy efficacy of our economy needs to be increased because elsewise all our eco-system services will be minus.”

The Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission

The 56^th Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission took place from Monday 19 July to Thursday 22 July in Sorrento, Italy. The Meeting pitted whaling nations like Japan, Iceland, and Norway against countries trying to maintain and strengthen the global moratorium on commercial whaling. The 18 year long moratorium on commercial whaling is still in place, but there will be no whale sanctuaries in the South Pacific or the South Atlantic at least for another year.

Some whaling countries like Japan, Norway, and Iceland, have suggested controlled killing of such animals would help reduce the growing strain on the fishing industry. But the report by researchers of the University of British Columbia in Canada, which mapped the globe's fisheries and compared that with the fish consumption of sea mammals, found little overlap between the two. According to them, only about 1 percent of what marine mammals eat is in high conflict areas. The study, unveiled at the Annual Commission meeting, counters arguments put forward by pro-whaling nations that cetaceans, protected under international law, devour valuable fish stocks that could be used to feed humans.

WWF calls on Royal Dutch Shell to suspend the Sakhalin oil project in the Russian Far East pending a full review after the International Whaling Commission endorsed a report describing this project as a threat to the survival of the critically endangered western gray whale.

An accompanying resolution — proposed by the UK, South Africa, Belgium, and Germany — was adopted by consensus at the meeting. The Russian Federation represented at the meeting by the All-Russian Scientific and Research Institute for Fish Industry and Oceanography joined the resolution. The IWC unanimously approved the report and called for urgent measures to be taken to protect this whale population which is perilously close to extinction. Only 100 western gray whales including 23 reproductive females are known to exist.

WWF fears that the construction of the off shore drilling platform and the installation of a seabed pipeline near Sakhalin Island could drive away the whales from their only feeding ground. It has repeatedly called on Shell to support an independent review of the pipeline project by the world's whale experts.

Aarhus Clearing-House Launched

A new “environmental democracy” clearing house is being launched by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) to highlight and promote awareness of issues covered by the Aarhus Convention. The clearing house showcases good practices in citizens' environmental rights and is expected to make implementation of the Convention more effective.

The Aarhus clearing house provides a forum for the collection, dissemination and exchange of information on laws, policies and good practices relevant to the rights of public access to information, public participation in environmental decision-making and public access to justice on environmental issues. In addition to information related to the Aarhus Convention, the clearing house also contains other information relevant to the implementation of principle 10 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, adopted at the Earth Summit in 1992. It, therefore, has the potential to become a leading global repository of information on this theme.

The clearing house provides information for a wide range of users, including governments, intergovernmental organizations, NGOs, students and researchers, and the general public.

The clearing house will help the Convention's compliance mechanism by providing ready access to information on national implementing legislation and practices. Information gathered through the reporting requirements under the Aarhus Convention will be available through the clearing house. Non-governmental organizations may also submit information to the clearing house.

Mr. Kaj Barlund, Director of the UNECE Environment and Human Settlements Division, hopes that the Parties to the Convention will embrace the clearing house as “a mechanism for promoting access to information and widespread participation in the development of environmental democracy throughout the region and beyond.”

According to Ms. Svetlana Zhekova (Bulgaria), Chairperson of the Aarhus Convention's Task Force on Electronic Information Tools, “the Aarhus clearing house is a cost-effective electronic information tool providing a window on environmental democracy worldwide. Easy access to information on how countries are applying the Aarhus Convention can provide an invaluable source of inspiration for other countries that work on developing their own procedures, mechanisms and legislation.”

A demo version of was shown at the 3rd meeting of the Aarhus Convention's Task Force on Electronic Information Tools (Geneva, 2 July) and from today it will be accessible to the public at large.

Educational Project on Climate Change in Central Asia

On July 1-4, an ordinary meeting of the working group of the project “The Climate Change Video and Posters” conducted by the Regional Environmental Centre for the Central Asia (CAREC) with the support of the British Embassy and the UNESCO office in Kazakhstan was held at the CAREC office.

The project aims to disseminate the manual on ecology for secondary schools in the sub-region of Central Asia through workshops for project working groups and teachers, posters and the video film on climate change. Posters and the film will be an additional didactic resource to the manual and may be used in an educational process in frames of courses of studies of natural subjects both together with the manual and separately.

Among the participants of the meeting were members of the working group for Kazakhstan — teachers, NGO representatives, officials of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan, members of the Coordination Centre on Climate Change in Kazakhstan, and an expert and trainer from the British NGO FSCEE James Hindson.

The outcomes of the meeting are versions of educational posters supplemented with text contents and the re-cast scenario of the video film, which were discussed with the beneficiaries of the project — teachers and students.

Taking into account the actuality of the climate change problem, modern educational methods and a personal-oriented approach, the following topics and headlines of posters were approved:

1. Does the climate change?
2. Where do extra degrees come from?
3. What happens to us if the climate will change?
4. Is it possible to stop the climate change?
5. What you can do to solve the climate change problem?

Also there was re-cast a questionnaire for students that would be filled in twice - at the beginning and after the end of the project — to check the progress made by 14-16 years old students after the usage of posters and the video film.

Posters and the film will be completed by professional artists, designers and video makers up to September, 2004, and presented first to the Central Asian Working Group for the Environmental Education, and than to the Conference of the States of the Central Asia in November, 2004, in Almaty.

UNEP Has Opened the Carpathian Office in Vienna

United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) has opened a new office in Vienna to focus on protecting the Carpathian mountain range and promoting environmental cooperation in Central and Southeastern Europe. The Carpathian mountain range spans the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia and Ukraine.

Among the new office's duties will be to serve as the interim Secretariat of the Framework Convention on the Protection and Sustainable Development of the Carpathians, which was adopted and signed in May 2003. The Carpathian mountain range has a unique ecosystem and hosts endangered species including the brown bear, wolf and lynx, and close to 4,000 partly endangered plant species.