Forest fires in Russia have increased in scale in recent years. While climatic conditions do influence the incidence of fires, their increase also reflects socioeconomic changes and policy failures associated with the forest management system in Russia, such as the overemphasis on privatized forestry and the misallocation of forest protection budgets disfavoring the sparsely populated and forest-rich eastern regions

Gavrilyeva, Tuyara

Isaev, Aleksandr

Narita, Daiju

English

SSOAR - Social Science Open Access Repository 

www.ssoar.infoChallenges of Forest Fires in RussiaNarita, Daiju; Gavrilyeva, Tuyara; Isaev, AleksandrVeröffentlichungsversion / Published VersionZeitschriftenartikel / journal articleEmpfohlene Zitierung / Suggested Citation:Narita, D., Gavrilyeva, T., & Isaev, A. (2021). Challenges of Forest Fires in Russia. Russian Analytical Digest, 272, 5-8.https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000511730Nutzungsbedingungen:Dieser Text wird unter einer CC BY-NC-ND Lizenz(Namensnennung-Nicht-kommerziell-Keine Bearbeitung) zurVerfügung gestellt. Nähere Auskünfte zu den CC-Lizenzen findenSie hier:https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.deTerms of use:This document is made available under a CC BY-NC-ND Licence(Attribution-Non Comercial-NoDerivatives). For more Informationsee:https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0Diese Version ist zitierbar unter / This version is citable under:https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-87763-5RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST No. 272, 25 October 2021 5tine, we will start witnessing the purposeful reduction of GHG emissions and greater climate change aware-ness and concern, which, hopefully, may become more prominent across Russia.About the AuthorDr. Marianna Poberezhskaya is an Associate Professor at the Department of Social and Political Sciences, Notting-ham Trent University.References• Graybill J (2013) Imagining resilience: situating perceptions and emotions about climate change on Kamchatka, Russia. GeoJournal 78: 817–832• Henry, L. and McIntosh Sundstrom, L. (2012) Russia’s climate policy: International bargaining and domestic modernization. Europe-Asia Studies, 64(7):1297–1322• Kokorin A, Korppoo A (2013) Russia’s post-Kyoto climate policy. Real action or merely window-dressing?, FNI Climate Policy Perspectives 10.• Makarov, I., Suslov, D., Stepanov, I. and Serova, D. (2021) Povorot k prirode: Novaya ekologicheskaya politika Rossii v usloviyakh zelenoy transformatsii mirovoy ekonomiki i politiki. Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya. https://publications.hse.ru/en/books/461134312• Mel'nikov, Yuri and Daneeva, Yumzhana (2021): Evropeiskoe napryazhenie. Kak uglerodnyi nalo otrazitsya na ros-siiskom eksporte elektronergii v ES, Forbes Russia, 07 July 2021, https://www.forbes.ru/biznes/435609-evropeyskoe-napryazhenie-kak-uglerodnyy-nalog-otrazitsya-na-rossiyskom-eksporte?utm_source=yxnews&utm_medium=desktop&utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fyandex.ru%2Fnews%2Fsearch%3Ftext%3D• Poberezhskaya, M (2016) Communicating Climate Change in Russia: state and propaganda. Routledge, AbingtonANALYSISChallenges of Forest Fires in RussiaBy Daiju Narita (University of Tokyo), Tuyara Gavrilyeva (North-Eastern Federal University, Yakutsk), and Aleksandr Isaev (Institute for Biological Problems of the Cryolithozone, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences)DOI: 10.3929/ethz-b-000511730AbstractForest fires in Russia have increased in scale in recent years. While climatic conditions do influence the inci-dence of fires, their increase also reflects socioeconomic changes and policy failures associated with the for-est management system in Russia, such as the overemphasis on privatized forestry and the misallocation of forest protection budgets disfavoring the sparsely populated and forest-rich eastern regions.IntroductionLarge-scale events of wildfires in Siberia in recent years have promoted worldwide interest in the situations of wildfires in Russia. They have broad implications not only for Russia domestically but also for global air qual-ity and climate. Some scientific studies have indicated that climate change could increase the occurrence of Siberian wildfires in the future through the effects of warmer and drier climate conditions, northward shifts in vegetation patterns, and permafrost thawing (reviewed by Leskinen et al., 2020). The threat of enhanced wild-fires as a climate-related long-term risk also seems to be gradually recognized at the level of the national govern-ment. As the latest development, in August 2021, Presi-dent Vladimir Putin stated that there was a connection between climate change and large-scale wildfires in Sibe-ria in the summer of that year (Tass 2021).Wildfires themselves may occur and spread outside of tree-covered forest areas, but the national patterns and trends of fires mirror the status of forests in Russia and their public management system. Natural drivers, including climatic conditions, do influence the inci-RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST No. 272, 25 October 2021 6dence of fires, but socioeconomic and policy-related fac-tors are also important determinants of the trends of for-est fires in Russia. The intensification of fire events in recent years could be in part a reflection of policy fai-lures as well as socioeconomic changes that took place over the decades in Russia.Trends of Forest Fires in Russia Documented in the National StatisticsSatellite-based data on fire occurrence in Russian forests are openly available and have been discussed extensively in the natural scientific literature, and the data indicate an increasing trend of fire-affected areas in Siberia in recent years (e.g., Ponomarev et al., 2021). The official data published by the Russian government also broadly confirm this trend—the annual average fire-affected area increased from 0.6 million hectares in 1991–1995 to 4.9 million hectares in 2015–2019 according to the National Russian Statistical Agency Rosstat, which is also the source of the statistical data referred to in the following text. However, the annual average of fire cases actually decreased substantially during the same period, from approximately 22,000 cases in 1991–1995 to 12,000 cases in 2015–2019 nationally. Meanwhile, the total area of forests in Russia remained mostly unchanged dur-ing that period (approximately 1,180 million hectares).Russian governmental statistics also record the causes of fires. In the 1995–2011 period in which data were available, a dominant proportion of fire incidences (75% of all documented fire cases) was caused by human factors, whereas the economic activities of organizations and natural factors such as dry storms were responsible for 10% and 9% of events, respectively. At least over that period, no systematic trend was apparent for the share of natural factors, while the percentage of “human factors” showed a decline (from 84% in 1995–1999 to 61% in 2007–2011).The above-shown counteracting dynamics of increas-ing fire-affected areas on the one hand and decreasing numbers of fires on the other hand are apparently per-plexing, but some general trends of socioeconomic sit-uations and policies in Russia that have existed over the last decades may explain this pattern. In discussing socioeconomic developments in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), which hosts a vast share of forests of the Rus-sian Federation, Narita et al. (2021) noted that the col-lectivization policy in the Soviet era and progressive urbanization over previous decades reduced the number of settlements and population in the remote forest areas in Yakutia, resulting in decreased interfaces between forests and people.1 More precisely, “in the absence of a threat to settlements or economic facilities in cases where the projected costs of extinguishing a forest fire exceed the projected harm that may be caused by them.”On the one hand, this shift reduced the frequency of fires, but on the other hand, this transition led to the neglect of forests and consequently might have served as a factor that increased the size of events once a fire occurred. Enhanced remoteness of forest areas from human settlements also means increased difficulties in terms of accessing the fire sites by public fire manage-ment operations. Under the Russian system, the govern-ment is not obliged to extinguish forest fires if they do not affect human activities and settlements1 (i.e., in the areas designated as “forest fire control zones,” which rep-resents the system introduced in October 2015 by the order of the Ministry of Natural Resources).The links between the trends of socioeconomic con-ditions and fires are not limited in Yakutia and might also exist at the federal level. Table 1 on p. 8 shows that Russia’s two easternmost federal districts (Siberian and Far Eastern Federal Districts) both exhibited a decline in the population density and an increase in the fire-affected areas in the last two decades, while the fire-affected areas have in fact decreased substantially in the same period in the relatively urban two federal districts where Moscow and St. Petersburg are located (Central and Northwestern Federal Districts), possibly as a result of targeted resource allocation by the federal government for fire operations to areas with high population den-sities. The fire-affected areas of these latter federal dis-tricts, however, are negligible in size compared to those of the former districts.The Russian System of Management of Forest FiresThe Russian Federation has a comprehensive system of forest management, in which both the federal govern-ment and the regions (regional administrative units) have functions, and the management of forest fires is incorporated in this framework. Its institutional fea-tures reflect the history of the system, which once went through major disruptions around the perestroika era.The current primary law determining the Russian system of forest management is the Forest Code, which was established in 1997 and amended in 2006. The Code makes it explicit that the government is responsible for extinguishing forest fires and for other fire safety mea-sures. Under the law, regional governments carry out most forest safety management operations within the framework of the powers delegated to them by the fed-eral government, while the federal government provides funding to the regional governments for these measures. In some areas of activities, however, the federal govern-ment still directly engages in managerial operations.RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST No. 272, 25 October 2021 7In the context of fire safety, these interventions include aircraft-based fire extinguishing activities con-ducted by the Federal Budgetary Institution “Aviale-sookhrana.” As mentioned in Narita et al. (2021), avi-ation is a major means for forest fire management in Russia and contributes to the elimination of approxi-mately 40% of them nationally. Today, this federal institution consists of 30 teams with 560 service workers (Kozlov 2021). Additionally, in the event of large-scale fires when the forces of the federal institution and of local forest workers and firefighting services are insufficient, different resources may be mobilized. For example, in 2021, organized volunteers made a great contribution to extinguishing forest fires and helping the affected resi-dents in Yakutia. Furthermore, in some cases, the army may be involved in extinguishing forest fires.A factor that adds complexity to the Russian system of forest management is that the actual jurisdiction over forestland is separately established from the responsibil-ities for safety-related operations. By maintaining the system established in the Soviet era, the entire forest-land (“forest fund”) of the country still lies under the jurisdiction of the federal government, which regulates commercial forestry activities in the fund.Failure of Forest Management as a Driver of the Intensification of Forest Fires in RussiaThe separation between the responsibilities for forest safety and protection on the one hand and those of util-ization of forest resources on the other hand is a prob-lem for forest management in Russia. For example, the emphasis on the privatization of forestry activities under the Forest Code has reduced the size of the staff engaged in forestry operations, leading to the neglect of fire pre-vention measures. Additionally, the current system of commercial-based forestry assumes a high productiv-ity of forests applicable only to European Russia and cannot be sustained in the low-productivity forests of Siberia, where large-scale incidents of forest fires have occurred in recent years.The abovementioned system of forest fire control zones, in which fires are practically left abandoned by the public system of fire protection, is another form of failure. Today, the area of the control zones is approxi-mately 45% of the total forest fund. In 2019, 90% of catastrophic fires in Siberia and the Far East occurred precisely in the control zones, mainly in the Krasnoy-arsk Territory, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and the Irkutsk Region. In total (including fires in “unofficial” forests, for example, not on the lands of the forest fund), the fire covered an area of almost 15 million hectares. Greenpeace made an appeal to the State Council last year, with the support of over 400,000 Russians, about the reduction of the share of control zones. Accordingly, the government is expected to review and revise the des-ignation of zones. (Greenpeace 2020)The need to adjust the forest management system to the increased risks of fires is beginning to be considered in the policy domain. On 13 September 2021, President Putin instructed the federal government to increase the amount of funding for forest protection from wildfires to 14 billion rubles a year (equal to approximately 192 million USD at the current exchange rate). These costs will be included in the federal budget in the next year and will be distributed to the Avialesookhrana and Rus-sian regions in the form of subsidies. The distribution method of subsidies, which is currently based on the population density and disfavors the forest-rich eastern regions, could also be changed. In 2021, the amount of federal money for forest protection from wildfires was 6 billion rubles (82 million USD).Russian forests and their fire safety measures have significance for the health and life of both domestic and global populations. The Russian government should rec-ognize such multifaceted meanings of its forests and increase public funding for forest protection correspond-ing to the social benefits of its forests and forest safety.About the AuthorsDaiju Narita is an Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Arts and Science, the University of Tokyo, Japan.Tuyara Gavrilyeva, Doctor of Economics, is a Professor at the Institute of Engineering & Technology, North-East-ern Federal University, Yakutsk, Russia. She is also a leading researcher at the Department of Regional Economic and Social Studies, Federal Research Center “Yakutian Scientific Center”, Siberian Branch, RAS.Aleksandr Isaev, Doctor of Biology, is a Deputy Director at the Institute for Biological Problems of Cryolithic Zone, Federal Research Center “Yakutian Scientific Center”, Siberian Branch, RAS. He is also a Professor at the Institute of Natural Sciences. North-Eastern Federal University, Yakutsk, Russia.References• Greenpeace (2020): Zony kontrolya: ne tol'ko sokrashchat' ploshchad', no I finansirovat' okhranu, https://green-peace.ru/news/2020/06/23/zony-kontrolja-ne-tolko-sokrashhat-ploshhad-no-i-finansirovat-ohranu-nbsp/.RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST No. 272, 25 October 2021 8• Kozlov, A. (2021): The Head of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment in an interview to RBC, 13 September 2021, https://www.rbc.ru/business/13/09/2021/613b3f8f9a7947546ee1b83a#chapter_1• Leskinen, P., Lindner, M., Verkerk, P.J., Nabuurs, G.J., Van Brusselen, J., Kulikova, E., Hassegawa, M. and Lerink, B. (eds.): 2020. Russian forests and climate change. What Science Can Tell Us 11. European Forest Insti-tute, https://doi.org/10.36333/wsctu11.• Narita, D., Gavrilyeva, T., and Isaev, A., (2021): Impacts and management of forest fires in the Republic of Sakha, Russia: A local perspective for a global problem. Polar Science 27, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polar.2020.100573.• Ponomarev, E., Yakimov, N., Ponomareva, T., Yakubailik, O. and Conard, S.G. (2021): Current Trend of Carbon Emissions from Wildfires in Siberia. Atmosphere 12(5), 559, https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos12050559.• Tass (2021): Scale of wildfires, flash floods in Russia largely connected to climate change, Putin says, 05 August 2021, https://tass.com/society/1323113.Table 1: Population Density and Incidents of Forest Fires in Four Federal Districts (Annual Averages for 2000–2004 and 2015–2019)Population density  (persons/sq km)Number of forest fires Fire-affected areas (hectares)2000–20042015–2019Trend 2000–20042015–2019Trend 2000–20042015–2019TrendSiberian Federal District 4.1 3.9 {41,39} 9,191 3,797 {92,38} 554,422 1,810,811 {6,18}Far Eastern Federal District 1.3 1.2 {13,12} 6,119 4,031 {61,40} 927,244 3,015,795 {9,30}Central Federal District 58.3 60.4 {58,60} 4,396 457 {44,5} 11,285 1,885 {11,2}Northwestern Federal District 8.3 8.3 {83,{83, 4,134 903 {41,{9, 65,836 7,336 {66,7}Source: compiled by the authorsSee also satellite data on fires and burned areas on pp. 9–10.

Challenges of Forest Fires in Russia

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Challenges of Forest Fires in Russia

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