Forest Club model projects and sites

B. 'Licensed' But Illegal Forest Felling Operations

The existence of official permits for cutting operations does not always mean that a particular cutting is legal. More often that not, cutting permits are issued in defiance of current legislation. In other instances, written permits are out of line with "on site" permits, or the cutting as it is performed violates the conditions specified in the permit. In all the above cases, cuttings should also be considered illegal, with the culprits subject to criminal penalties.

5. Issuing permits for felling in areas where felling is prohibited or not envisioned in current legislation

a) A classical example is cuttings in specially protected natural areas, or areas where cuttings are explicitly forbidden by the nature protection regime.

Normally, such violations are caused by two basic reasons. First, leskhoz employees are ignorant of current legislation and/or have no access to information on whether their leskhoz includes specially protected natural areas (primarily, regional-level ones). Second, state forest registration and forest inventory are frequently blind to bans on industrial operations in specially protected natural areas. According to current legislation, forest inventory recommendations are mandatory. In the recent years, the number of such violations has somewhat declined as a result of strict measures taken by state environmental protection agencies.

Now that all supervising agencies have been united in one ministry, the number of such violations should drastically increase.

Specially protected natural areas are often corrupted following the exhaustion of accessible wood in adjacent areas. In such cases, protected areas are targeted by forest-logging companies. The attempts to invade protected areas are sometimes aimed at the abolition of their status as such.

Besides, on many occasions cutting permits are issued under pressure from local authorities. In 1999 and 2000, the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Bashkortostan ordered the felling of several dozens of square kilometers of woods in Bashkiriya National Park.

b) Cuttings not envisioned in forest inventory documents.

According to current legislation, forest inventory documents (including logging plans) form the basis for the planning of all economic activities, including cuttings. Deviations from forest inventory documents (including plans for cutting not envisioned by forest inventory) are possible, but only on serious grounds, such as changes in the forest health condition, natural disasters, or errors in forest inventory. In all the above cases, the procedure for amendments is unwieldy. In many regions, however, we encountered cuttings not approved by forest inventory performed with no excuses offered at all. This is normally done at the orders of an individual forest user, especially if this user is also the de facto unofficial authority in the area. We witnessed such cases in Leningrad, Arkhangelsk and Chita Oblasts, and in the Republic of Buryatiya. The practice, however, must be spread even more widely, since most regions lack the mechanisms to detect such violations.

"Profit cuttings" not envisioned in forest inventory are popular, to various degrees, among leskhozes (departments of the Federal Forest Service) in all regions where such cuttings are a significant source of profit for FFS.

In this chapter we are not referring to situations in which the grounds for excessive cuttings are legislative amendments made after the forest inventory. Such cuttings (provided the interpretations of new legislation are correct) are legitimate. On several occasions, however, we could see economically profitable regulatory amendments introduced enthusiastically, while others were postponed until the next forest inventory session. In 1997 and 1998, leskhozes in Leningrad Oblast were vehemently conducting regeneration (obnovlenye) and re-formation (pereformyrovanye) cuttings provided for in the new Instruction on Thinning Cutting and not in the forest inventory. At the same time, those leskhozes continued accretion cuttings in maturing forests, referring to forest inventory documents, although that same new Instruction prohibited such cuttings in these forests.

6. Issuing logging permits with violations of the existing procedure for permit issuing, or without the assessment of the real logging capacity without violations of current legislation

a) issuing permits without real assessment of the volume of wood allocated on stump, or with gross errors in the calculation of volume.

Every logging operation itself should be preceded by forest management agencies (leskhozes) determining the size of the reserve in the plot and the value of wood allocated on stump. The procedure for determining the volume of wood to be cut is quite sophisticated, which results in numerous violations at this stage, some of them caused by low-quality ("office-based") calculation methods, others proceeding from deliberate errors made at the request of individual forest users. In this case, the actual sampling, by volume and/or tree-species composition, does not correspond to the permit. The cutting becomes illegal. Upon receiving the plot into his operation, the forest user signs a protocol, thus confirming that allocation documents reflect the real situation and assuming all responsibility for further developments. The monopoly enjoyed by leskhozes does not allow forest users (companies) to argue with leskhozes. Our data show that gross violations in wood allocation occur in all regions of Russia, whereas in a number of regions (Leningrad, Novgorod, Arkhangelsk, Sakhalin, Chita, Irkutsk and Amur Oblasts, Khabarovsk and Krasnoyarsk Krays, Republic of Karelia) it has become a predominant practice. The Rosleskhoz itself confirms the low quality of allocations.

b) issuing permits to companies unauthorized to be engaged in logging operations

In compliance with legislation, a company intending to conduct logging activities should undergo a licensing procedure. In the absence of a pertinent federal regulation, each region has its own licensing pattern. A number of regions still lack any endorsed licensing procedure. However, a more curious precedent is set by both licensed and unlicensed forest loggers operating within the boundaries of a single region. Unlicensed operators are often considered "privileged", i. e. they have reliable 'friends' in the regional administration. A recent example is the logging in a Sakhalin military forestry in the years 1999-2000. The cutting has been carried out by an unlicensed company owned by Sakhalin's former deputy governor. Such situations are very frequent in the Far East regions and in the European part of Russia (for example, see the 'Priamurskiye Vesti' (Priamurye News) newspaper, April 1999).

c) issuing permits to companies physically incapable of cutting and transporting wood using technologies authorized for the specific conditions.

This type of violations is especially characteristic of the Far East where skidding and transportation of wood upon the creeks or springs are forbidden, whereas a network of spawning-protected forest strips is highly developed. In such cases, leskhozes issue permits without realistically assessing the companies' capacity for transporting logged wood. As a result, violations have become inevitable, with apparently no one to blame. There are reasons to believe that in many cases there is a blatant collusion between forest users and leskhoz employees.

The same applies to a number of prohibited technologies and logging types (especially terrace loggings in mountainous areas of the Far East and field cuttings) carried out as clear cuttings in areas so remote from processors and consumers that real clear cutting under such conditions becomes insolvent.

d) issuing cutting permits based on dubious (or wrong) interpretations of forest management laws and regulations.

This is a multi-faceted widespread practice with regional peculiarities. For example, when measuring how steep the logging site slope is (which determines whether logging should be permitted here or not), the slope should be measured from the top border to the lower border of the plot. Depending on how the logging plot is located along the slope, the steepness can be either emphasized or concealed. When measuring the sides of logging sites, in case the slope is over 6 degrees, the measurements should be emended. The size of the officially declared volume of wood at the site depends on whether or not the above has been performed. A large number of violations have to do with interpretations of the Instructions on Thinning Cutting, particularly in the case of regeneration and re-formation cuttings.

7. Entering deliberate amendments into forest management documentation, formally allowing cuttings otherwise prohibited

Thus, for many years Gastello leskhoz in Sakhalin has been exporting large volumes (7136.7 cubic meters in 1999) of top-quality spruce sawwood to Japan. Normally this is one or two lower pieces of large straight trunks. However, the leskhoz logs such wood primarily in the course of selective sanitary cuttings. To log wood of the same quality and in the same quantity, mostly healthy trees have to be felled, which implies a bold violation of the Sanitary Rules for the Forests of the Russian Federation.

The most frequent kind of violation is the exaggeration (or invention) of the degree to which a forest is afflicted with pests or diseases, so that immediate selective or clear felling is necessary. Such incidents are quite frequent. We encountered them in all the regions studied. The selection of stands and the volume of such fellings depend exclusively on the impertinence of a particular leskhoz administrator. Although the sylvipathological condition of the forests should be assessed by an experienced sylvipathologist, formally independent from the leskhoz this is not the case in all areas. In reality, leskhozes rarely have any problems prescribing cuttings 'to restore forest health' (sanitary cuttings). The documents regulating the allocation and permission for logging are stored in the leskhoz, the sylvipathological department and/or the forestry administration of th region. They do not transcend the walls of the interested agency. Due to this it is often hard to determine whether the violations have occurred at the point of preparation or actual felling.

Another example is selective sanitary cuttings on the Karelian Isthmus where according to Felling ticket # 92 of the Vyborg leskhoz dated April 9, 1997 the firewood output was expected to be about 1.5%, which is impossible in case of high quality allocation and tapping of a sanitary cutting. An independent multilateral check in three leskhozes discovered several dozens of such felling tickets for the total volume of more than 100,000 cubic meters of timber.

Ordered allocation of cuttings occurs in connection to alleged changes in the health condition of forests and often serves not only the interests of leskhozes but the interests of forest consumers as well.

For example in 1998 workers of one of the forestry units (leskhozes) in the Republic Bouryatya took representative from NGOs for businessmen from Moscow and started reporting that all the papers about the "lethal" disease of a Siberian Pine forest plot were almost ready. Papers for the cutting were also ready, but as they claimed the timber was healthy and of the highest quality. They offered to go to the forest plot in question and judge for themselves. For your information we can tell you that the Forestry Code of the Russian Federation prohibits final cuttings in the Siberian Pine forests. Only thinning and felling of ill and dead trees are allowed in such forests.

Another example came to us from the Kikinsky leskhoz in the Republic of Buryatia 1999). On November 10, 1998 the Kikinsky leskhoz issued felling ticket #106 to the "Baikal Forest Company" Ltd. to carry out a regeneration cutting in the block 23 of the Verkhne-Itantsinsky forest area. The cutting was supposed to be 272m3/ha of merchantable wood with the stock of growing timber 280m3/ha according to the forest inventory materials. That meant a clear cutting in a forest with the basic density equal to 0.8. The on-stump wood allocation was to be free according to the lease contract. By the time the felling ticket was actually issued, the lease contract had not passed the State registration, which meant that according to the Forest Code the contract was void. However, the privileges given to the lessee remained. Due to the fact that this cutting was not provided by the forestry project (forest inventory) for the territory, rented by the Baikal Forest Company Ltd, the leskhoz informed the company about the possibility of revoking their felling ticket. This means that the felling ticket was first issued and only after that they started to make sure whether they could issue this document. No wonder that by the time the leskhoz decided to withdraw the felling ticket the forest cutting in the area had started and was already at full force. The company found itself in a strange position. If the felling ticket was withdrawn, it would simple to acknowledge the felling activities unsanctioned and then, in addition to huge penalties, it would be punished under Article 260 of the Russian Federation Criminal Code "Illegal Cutting of Trees and Bushes". The company decided to fight for this forest plot, which was not difficult for Mr. Pruidze, because he, the Head of the Baikal Forest Company had very good relationships with the highest bosses of the Forestry Ministry in the Republic of Buryatia. So, on December 7, 1998 the Baikal Forest Company sent letter #781 to the Forestry Ministry of Buryatia with a request to issue a felling ticket for regeneration cutting in the above mentioned forest plot (the ticket had been issued almost a month before). According to a resolution of December 8, 1998 (the next day after the letter was sent, an awfully short time to consider a forest company request) deputy minister A.V. Martynov orders to the leskhoz to permit a clear sanitary cutting. He only ordered to arrange a forest pathology research because logging in this place was not included in the forest inventory. If we translate it into plain English then the main idea of the whole affair would be that if one cannot cut wood here but has a very strong desire to do so, one can arrange a clear cutting if it is shown that the forest is sick. The same day, that is December 8, 1998, forest pathology expert A.Y. Chernyaev and forester Y.I. Shtayer completed an Examination act of forest pathology research in this forest plot. This research showed that the forest had fulfilled its water protection, environmental and other functions, and now it obstructed the growth and development of the young stand. From these materials, including set of special tables it was obvious that forest needs a sanitary clear cutting. Inparticular it was shown that on all 5 sample areas studied, exactly 100% of all trees were attributed to the third condition category (very weak). The cause of the weakness was 'core rot' of an unknown origin. Obviously, the task presented to the executors was not clear enough, because after the research it was recommended to carry out a regeneration cutting with mandatory labeling of the trees subject to felling activities, instead of a sanitary clear cutting. The papers written after the forest pathology research were filled with serious violations. On December 11, 1998 the Forestry Ministry of the Republic of Buryatia issued permit #1319 to carry out regeneration cutting in compartment 23, allotment 15 with the total area of 13 ha. The permit was issued based on the Examination act of December 8, 1998. Nevertheless, the leskhoz changed the felling ticket to arrange a sanitary clear cutting. The Buryatia Forestry Ministry never issued an official permit to carry out a sanitary clear cutting. Obviously, the leskhoz had already changed the felling ticket on December 8 or 9 upon receiving Mr. Martynov's order, not waiting for the necessary permits to be prepared.

Very often the figures showing the specie composition and density of forest stands are not given correctly, which makes it possible to arrange more intensive cuttings or carry out cuttings in forest stands with a significant share of valuable tree species with no appropriate limitations.

Along with such rather simple and very widely spread schemes there are other more sophisticated ones. For example, on the Sakhalin foresters very often forge records of introduction of changes into forest inventory materials. For instance, to carry out a cutting on a steep slope (banned by the Regional cutting-practice rules) a forester from the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk forges a document. In this document, he asserts that the slope is not really as steep as it was recorded in the forest inventory materials and that it is suitable for logging. The fact is that the Forest Felling Regulations refer to slopes in general and say nothing about the slope on loggers' roads. The difference between these two is the same as the difference between the slope of the hills and the slope of the road running between the hills. The same situation is quite common for many other leskhozes of the Sakhalinsk Region.

We have some rough estimates, but according to them at least 20% of intermediate felling in Russia (i.e. at least 5 million m3 in 1999) are illegal due to decisions drawn to justify violations of the existing legislation.

8. Intentional mistakes of Forest Inventory

Forest inventory organized partially according to the existing legislation and partially according to the illegal interests of the client has been a usual practice in Russia for the last decades. The fact is that when organizing any forest inventory, it becomes necessary to determine what and how one might cut during the following 10 years and in some cases during much larger periods of time. That's why agreements between logging companies (including leskhozes) and forest inventors are a common practice in Russia. However, in recent years a few new details were introduced into this system. Under the Provisions of a lease, a year after the transfer agreement was signed each lessee should present to the renter a plan of final felling operations and other forestry operations in the rented plot of the forest fund. If the term of lease is 2 to 5 years, the lessee should present a plan of cuttings. If a forestry area (a part of sylvicultural enterprise) is leased in parts, especially if the parts belong to different holders, the plan of felling operations is designed for each part separately. As a result, the total volume of cuttings for all the rented sites together is very often higher than the volume allowed, adopted and passed EIA for the area in general. According to the legislation the timber volume for forest management have to be previously set for the whole leskhoz. Under the existing legislation no check is required to see whether the sum of volumes of timber produced by these separate plots correspond to the officially set volume for the whole leskhoz. There is strong reason to believe that such changes in the forest inventory never take place without appropriate investments on the part of interested partners.

Traditionally wood stock on the plot is underestimated during forest inventory as well as forest density is overestimated. Very often there are 'mistakes' in the species composition or age determination. Such violations and 'mistakes' are common forest inventory practice in Russia.

It does not seem possible to assess the amount of logging resulted from such violations and 'mistakes'.

9. Forest cuttings carried out with abuse of the existing legislation

a) overlogging by volume and area. Overlogging by volume is more characteristic for non-clear cuttings with allocation of wood by quantity. In this case timber consumers take advantage of the weak points of legislation and, in particular, the absence of a procedure of true assessment of logged material quantity. Under the rules that are effective now, volumes of logged wood are determined by wood storage made by the logger or by other information presented again by the logger. Hence, if the logger does not show everything, or does not record the true volumes, then overlogging remains unnoticed. One can prove that overlogging has really taken place only by counting the stumps, but the existing legislation describes such a procedure only partially and does not mention it as being mandatory, for such occasions. The result is that in all regions where such cuttings take place (for example the Leningrad Region, Karelia, Buryatia, and the Khabarovsk region) average overlogging reaches 30 to 40%.

Overlogging very often takes place under allocation of wood on the stump with the individual labeling of every tree that is to be cut. The problem is that the label does not have any security categories. Moreover, timber consumers themselves long ago started labeling and allocating trees for cutting without leskhozes. In such a situation it will not be too difficult to mark additional trees. From our experience we know that such overlogging seldom exceeds 15-20%. The existing forestry legislation has absolutely no leverage to fight this type of overlogging.

Overlogging by area is something that cannot be contained very often. Such overlogging often takes place due to mistakes foresters make while allocating wood. The fact is that forester get paid dearly for such 'mistakes'. The second variant is when the felling operation passes beyond the borders of the forest plot allocated for cutting. While cutting of one or several trees beyond the borders of the logging site is a common practice almost everywhere, illegal cuttings of larger amounts of wood are typical for those regions where volumes of logged timber are very large and for the regions situated far from the supervising agencies. For example, in 1998 in the Pervomaysky leskhoz we watched construction of a new road leading toward logging sites that have not been allocated, yet. The logging company that constructed the road at the same time picked up all trees fit for cutting in the range of 30 meters on both sides of the roads without any permission to do this. Judging by the way the logways in this region looked, such a practice is a general rule here. In the same region we encountered an occasion when a company paid a forester and logged wood 500 meters beyond the borders of its logging site. The same situation can be observed in other regions as well. Another widely spread example is the cutting of trees beyond the borders of a particular logging site together with illegally move of the borders to cover the fact that a violation has actually taken place. Since the borders of a logging site are usually marked with nothing more than a hard-to-see cursor and small columns in the corners, it is very easy to move such a border. Such violations always remain unpunished because it is almost impossible to prove the company's connection to this violation.

In several leskhozes of the Leningrad region we met a situation when timber logged over the officially permitted amounts, were given to foresters under a corresponding preliminary agreement in order to 'build good relationships for the future'.

According to our estimates, such overlogging reaches 1.5-2 million m3 annually. It is very difficult to discover such violations during independent checks because there is no access to the necessary forestry documents and because there is always a covert agreement between leskhoz officers and logging companies.

b) change of composition and structure of chosen tree species.

It is a very common violation in a situation when a logging company can allocate wood by himself. Such violations are very wide spread in the regions with several tree species differing dramatically from one another in terms of price (center and northwest of the European part of Russia, the southern part of the Far East, the Northern Caucasus). These violations do not usually lead to significant fluctuations of logged wood volumes. It does not seem possible to assess what amount of wood is being logged when such violations occur.

c) non-observable cutting technologies and tree removal rules.

If an officially adopted technological map (map of skidding roads and truck road etc. on the logging site) does not provide for economically efficient and technologically simple methods to log wood or organize timber removal, logging companies usually resort to different violations. Generally, they change logway construction plans, build skidding roads and logways through the areas where such things are prohibited by law (for instance, along waterways), change location of technological sectors and so on. Very often such violations take place with no reference to heads of said logging company, meaning that this is only an initiative of workers (direct executors). Usually these violations do not directly affect volumes of logged wood.