ECONOMIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES OF RUSSIAN MILITARY AGGRESSION FOR THE FORESTRY OF UKRAINE

Abstract

Introduction. The war in Ukraine has led to catastrophic changes in people's lives, the environment and the country's economy, all sectors of the country's economy have been affected, in particular the agricultural sector, the energy supply sector, water supply, and the transport sector. Constant rocket attacks, fires, mining of territories, and felling of trees for the needs of the war have a negative impact on the state of the state's forest fund. The destruction of forests in Ukraine as a result of Russian aggression has become one of the many environmental disasters, and therefore, the issue of the state of the forestry sector is relevant.

Purpose. The purpose of the article is to investigate the crimes of the Russian Federation aimed at the destruction of Ukrainian forests and forest resources, as well as to find ways to overcome the crisis state of the forest ecosystem.

The results. The war launched by Russia against Ukraine daily threatens the country's ecological security, causing significant damage to forests and other natural landscapes, and hindering forestry activities in the country. During the military aggression by Russia, forest areas of Ukraine have suffered and are suffering huge losses. Along with other natural ecosystems, forests suffer the most. Because to restore them, it will first be necessary to demine the territory, then the burned trees must grow back for normal functioning, and this will also take at least 20-30 years.

In general, since February 24, 2022, almost 30% of forests have suffered varying degrees of damage from military operations. It should be noted that in the occupied and deoccupied territories, heavy military equipment is being moved through the forests, military units are located in the forests, and active combat operations are being conducted. This leads to serious violations of forest ecosystems, as well as soil and water pollution. Currently, a full assessment of forest losses in the deoccupied territories is impossible due to contamination of forests with explosives, which poses potential risks to the lives of workers.

Experts have calculated the approximate scale of the environmental costs, which is more than 65 billion UAH of damage and almost 6.5 thousand cases of ecosystem destruction. However, the real damage caused to the environment by the war is much greater. It is noted that, according to the minimum estimate, the total cost of the lost forest exceeds 14 billion UAH. At the same time, these are only direct losses. That is, the cost of wood that could have been obtained from this area. These losses do not take into account the environmental consequences, the elimination of which can be much more expensive.

Using satellite images, it was established that over the two years of the war, the Russians completely destroyed more than 100 thousand hectares of forests in the territories they occupied.

During 2023, 593 fires were extinguished in the country's forests on an area of 906.8 hectares, of which 35 were large forest fires on a total area of 446.6 hectares, including 14.3 hectares of highlands. The average area of one fire was 1.5 hectares. Estimated losses amounted to more than 7 million UAH.

As a result of fires in Ukraine, the following were affected: forests - 320 thousand hectares; natural landscapes - 645 thousand hectares; agricultural lands - 1,340 thousand hectares; built-up areas - 129 thousand hectares. The fires have covered 425,000 hectares of protected areas, of which 292,000 hectares are in occupied territories and areas where hostilities are taking place.

Originality. For the first time, war crimes against forestry have been classified, which can be divided into seven groups: destruction of forest space through the appearance of craters, holes, and scattering of fragments; littering of forest territory with remnants of military equipment and missiles, mining of the territory; burning of forests and forest belts as a result of fires, destruction of plant life; change of landscape, air pollution; destruction of the forest ecosystem; theft of forest resources; death of animals, birds, and disturbance of the population of wild animals.

Conclusions. In conditions of martial law and in the post-war period, the issues of large-scale afforestation and reforestation will be acute to meet the increased needs of the state in wood due to the need to overcome the consequences of military operations; monitoring of forests with the creation of maps of affected territories and assessment of damage caused to forest ecosystems; determining priority measures for the preservation and restoration of objects of the forest and nature reserve fund of Ukraine, primarily those in which active hostilities took place. To this end, the geoportal "Forests of Ukraine" (https://forestry.org.ua) developed by UkrNDILGA and mobile applications for accessing and operating geospatial information on forestry management have been introduced into the activities of forestry branches.