Actuality January 28, 2008

   Russia possesses a quarter of world's reserves of wood, but at the same time its share in world's volume of production does not exceed 5%. As analysts consider, it mismatches the possibilities of the Russian Federation to get the income from wood comparable to oil and gas extraction.

So, the currency gain of Russian timber industry complex is six times less, than, for example, Canada, while its volume of a world's reserve of wood is 1,5 times less than Russian one.

   The main reasons of such lameness are in inefficient use of wood resources.

If the majority of the developed countries are guided by export of wood goods of high-level processing, Russia is still exporting raw materials. Russia provides about 40% of raw wood deliveries on the world market. By estimations of experts of Chamber of Commerce and Industry, for ten years volumes of export of round timber from Russia to the countries of Europe, first of all to the Northern one, have increased in 2,5 times.

   Every year about 600 million cubes of wood matures in Russia. And matured wood, even by ecology reasons, is necessary to be cut as without fail wheat is harvested.

But because of the absence of roads and other elements of infrastructure, and first of all because of not developed lumber industry, it is gathered at most 160 million cubes in Russia. It turns out, that matured wood is used only for 25-30%, bringing annually about $10 billion while at the maximum processing Russia could easily have $120-140 billion from wood a year.

The new Forestry

Code was approved; it was the attempt of the state to establish order in the Forestry.

It is not enough to approve the new code, it is difficult to realize it

   As notes Natalia Komarova, the chairman of Committee of the State Duma of the Russian Federation for natural resources, wildlife management and ecology, now it is still early to sum up, but it is a high time "to analyze the condition of the wood legislation at the present stage in order to reveal bottlenecks and to eliminate them, improving the government in the field of wood relations".

   The new Forestry Code, in her opinion, made new organizational and economic mechanisms of conducting forestry. Many powers on management of woods are transferred from federal level to the regions.

The list of use of woods in commercial usage is considerably expanded. It is established, that forest plots are let on lease by results of auction. Forestry enterprises passed into the ownership of

the regions of the Russian Federation and till January, 1st, 2008 will be transformed into forestry and recreational forests.

   The fundamental point of the Code: wood resources are property of all Russian people.

For this very reason transfer of woods to private property is out of the question, forest plots will be rented out for the term under 49 years. According to the new legal document such legal guarantees for Russians as being in forests without obstruction and free of charge, to gather mushrooms, berries, medicinal herbs for personal needs, to get firewood. The exception is made for the woods located on the lands, intended

for needs of military defense, forests in especially protected territories.

   The regulation about creation of wood plantations that lumberers require is included into Forestry Code. A forest plot usually contains uneven-aged trees of different species and the wood plantation is a woodland containing wood of that species and that quality which are necessary to the enterprise.

   And still it is not enough to approve Forestry Code; it's much more difficult to embody it. For example, the document contains the regulations aimed at development of wood infrastructure, including wood roads. But there are not enough means allocated for it, the absence of transport infrastructure in forests leads to that the big stocks of wood are inaccessible to harvesting and rot on the stalk, and harvested one is taken out mainly in winter conditions practically without roads with damage for ecology.

   In development of new legislation the Government of Russia developed and approved regulatory legal acts.

However, by the present moment 5 official documents provided by Forestry Code are not approved. For realization of Forestry Code it is necessary to pass some more laws and other legal acts of regions of the Russian Federation.

"Unfortunately, it is impossible to say, that in regions this work is carried out in full and according to the new Code," Natalia Komarova says. " So, in some regions forest users have duties on firefighting, and timber enterprises continue to combine economic functions

and functions of the state government of woods.

As a result not only Forestry Code is often broken but also Civil Code".