«CURRENT EVENTS»

MANAGEMENT EFFICIENCY IN RUSSIAN PROTECTED NATURAL AREAS

A meeting to assess PNA management efficiency was held by the WWF on January 21—25, 2002, at a holiday hotel outside Moscow.

The meeting concluded a series of similar regional meetings in 2001. The assessment was done within the framework of a WWF project using an international procedure developed by the WWF in accordance with a general plan proposed by the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas.

The fifty-seven participants included managers and experts of state nature reserves and national parks; representatives from the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources and its regional bodies as well as from the Russian Ministry of Agriculture’s Department of Hunting and Hunting Economy; and experts from conservation NGOs and research institutions. The participants assessed the conditions and management efficiency of 44 federal PNAs (nature reserves, national parks and zakazniks) in Central Russia and near the Volga in addition to the 130 federal and 25 regional PNAs that were assessed earlier.

The results of the meeting were as follows:

1. The assessment of negative impacts and potential threats in the PNA systems in the above regions is complete.
2. A comparative assessment of the ecological and social significance of PNAs has been done.
3. A comparative assessment of PNA management efficiency as well as of the strengths and weaknesses of the process specific to the above regions has also been done.
4. Those PNAs most in need of support were determined in accordance with their significance and the urgency of the problems they face.

The greatest negative impacts and threats to those regional PNAs under consideration were: pollution, natural disasters (primarily forest fires) and woodcuttings. Pollution has the worst effect on nature reserves, natural disasters — on national parks, and cuttings — on zakazniks. Meanwhile the general pressure of negative impacts will increase on PNAs generally over the next 5 years. The pressure will be particularly appreciable on zakazniks.

The PNAs most subjected to negative impacts are: Nizhnyaya Kama and Samarskaya Luka national parks; Khopersky and Tsentralno-Lesnoy nature reserves; and Voronezhsky and Kamennaya Steppe zakazniks. A considerable increase in these negative impacts is expected at Nizhnyaya Kama, Khopersky and Tsentralno-Lesnoy and Kamennaya Steppe.

The highest management efficiency indices were earned by Kerzhensky and Tsentralno-Chernozemny nature reserves, Ugra and Losiny Ostrov national parks, and Buturlin and Starokulatkinsky zakazniks; the lowest indices by Rostovsky and Khopersky nature reserves; Samarskaya Luka and Khvalynsky national parks; and Voronezhsky and Kamennaya Steppe zakazniks.

Taking into account biological and social significance, the level of negative impacts, and potential and actual threats as well as the management efficiency index, the following PNAs require immediate attention and support: Khopersky and Tsentralno-Lesnoy nature reserves; Nizhnyaya Kama and Samarskaya Luka national parks; and Ryazansky federal zakaznik. Additionally, Khopersky and Rostovsky reserves and Samarskaya Luka national park require a more detailed assessment of conditions and management efficiency in order to improve the management of these PNAs.

Given all the PNA categories under review, of the three basic management components, the weakest was the provisioning of resources, while the strongest was strategic planning, including specification and implementation of aims and objectives, their administrative and legal support, clarity of legal status, protection regime, and territory planning.

The aims and objectives of PNAs, and nature reserves in particular, have been formulated fairly clearly. They refer to future and current planning and are recognized by the PNA staff. The weakest point is the understanding and support of these PNA aims and objectives by the local population. Particularly this applies to nature reserves and zakazniks.

Federal PNAs, primarily nature reserves, have a reliable long-term legal base for qualitative management. However, the weakness of all PNAs is insufficient and unsustainable financing from the budget. Moreover, the status of national parks is weakened by land controversy and conflicts with other landowners. This is because the rights of these parks to land and other natural resources are not completely established in the current legislation; many legal norms have more than one meaning and can be interpreted variously. In comparison to nature reserves and national parks, the borders of zakazniks have not been properly designated, while the established regime is maintained less efficiently.

An analysis of the resource base showed that nature reserves and national parks are well supplied with means of communication, data collection and processing tools, which is usually a problem in zakazniks.

Almost all PNAs lack specialists, particularly qualified staff. However, this problem is greatest at zakazniks. PNA staffers are not satisfied with their salaries, though other labor conditions are regarded as more or less satisfactory. The administrative structure as well as the training and upgrading of staff were found to be generally satisfactory.

The meeting participants gave the lowest marks to material and technical equipment and facilitation of PNA functioning. The situation is especially frustrating with field-research equipment; zakazniks have the additional problem of a poorly developed infrastructure.

Applied management for all PNAs was found to be better than resource provisioning, which means that the level of practical work done in PNAs is higher than the level of PNA facilities. The nature reserves were the best at planning (particularly scientific research works), while in the national parks practical conservation work and eco-education were better than elsewhere. Research and monitoring in the nature reserves got the highest marks according to all indices. Weaknesses typical in PNA management practice were: insufficient topicality and poor relation of research to planning and management practice, low efficiency of research and inadequate qualification of researchers as well as general planning in management.

The highest marks went to PNA system projecting and planning (as compared with the indices of government management and the general political environment). The indices of projecting and planning of a number of PNAs were higher than the same indices for the system in general.

The strengths of PNA system planning were the well-founded choice of sites, their relatively high representativeness and biological as well as the undisturbed or virtually undisturbed nature of the ecosystems in the given PNAs. However, the configuration of the system in general is unsatisfactory, evidently insufficient and does not protect natural processes in the regions adequately. Additionally, natural resource use in adjacent areas of national parks and nature reserves is inadequate to their aims and objectives. Also, insufficient vital capacity of key species populations within their borders is typical in a number of reserves.

Efficiency indices of the state management of the PNA system and the political environment were considerably lower than projecting and planning. The meeting participants found the following weaknesses to be the most critical: low share of PNAs in the total area of the region; absence of precise objectives for recovering disturbed ecosystems; insufficient PNA management personnel training and upgrading; and weakness of the system in general.

In analyzing the general political environment of PNA system management, the lowest marks were given to office employee training (almost non-existent); political guarantees for sustainable PNA system management (most importantly the lack or absence of guarantees that PNAs will receive the necessary financing from the state budget); and political support of public and individual initiatives in the areas of sustainable forest use, eco-management, nature use and economic activities in PNAs. Other indices were also strikingly low: the political environment for effective PNA system management was called unfavorable.

This is the first time such a comprehensive evaluation of management efficiency in Russia’s PNA system with all the parties concerned and using international methodology. The results of this project will help improve cooperation in PNA management and promote multilateral support at the regional, federal and international levels.

This same international methodology has been used in China, France and South Africa as well as in a number of countries in Northern and Western Africa. In Russia, however, this methodology was applied to over 200 federal and regional PNAs as opposed to only 20 PNAs in China.

The WWF’s Russian Office plans to improve this methodology on the basis of the opinions of those experts who took part in the working meetings. The revised methodology for PNAs will be submitted to the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources.

[WWF Russian Office press release]

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