MP Oleksandr Matusevych does not want Ukraine to join the EU. He may say he is in favour, but if you look at the draft law No. 9516 authored by this MP, it becomes clear that he does not.
If passed, this draft law will hinder the implementation of a number of European agreements, laws and conventions. First and foremost, environmental ones. And it will become an obstacle on our path to EU membership. Despite the statements of the president, the prime minister and the deputy prime minister in charge, Olha Stefanishyna.
Although the title does not show this, on the contrary, Matusevych and Co. have skilfully veiled the essence of the document: “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on Effective Forest Management Based on Forestry on the Principles of Close-to-Nature Forestry Adapted to Climate Change, and Conservation of Biodiversity in Forests.” “Doesn’t it sound beautiful? But in reality, it is about the destruction of that very biodiversity.
In particular, the draft law provides for a rewrite of the Law on Environmental Impact Assessment.
“We once prescribed in the law ‘On Environmental Impact Assessment’ the need to assess the possible environmental impacts of logging with an area of one hectare or more. It literally sounds like this: “all continuous and gradual felling of the main use and continuous sanitary felling on an area of more than 1 hectare are subject to EIA”,
– says Ostap Yednak, MP of the 8th convocation of the Verkhovna Rada and one of the authors of the EIA law.
Now, Mr Matusevych and Co. are proposing to actually abandon the environmental impact assessment of clear-cutting. If adopted, the environmental impact assessment procedure for clear-cutting for areas of less than 10 hectares and for areas affected by fires, windfalls and “massive drying out” will be cancelled.
“In fact, this is the same as cancelling the EIA altogether!” Figures: in 2023, the State Enterprise “Forests of Ukraine” carried out 7786 clearance felling. Among them, there were only 26 sites with an area of more than 10 hectares,”
– the Ukrainian Environmental Protection Group notes. That is, if Matusevych’s law had already been in force, 7,760 logging operations would not have been subject to EIA, and no one would have checked whether they would harm the environment.
Environmentalists at a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada’s Environmental Policy Committee suggested that EIAs should be conducted for plots of 3 hectares or more. They also proposed to introduce a safeguard against abuse, so that fires, windstorms, and massive drying out would be recorded as part of the definition of an emergency. But this proposal was rejected by the majority of the committee members. Foresters want to determine where to cut, how to cut, and what to cut.
A powerful step was also taken to narrow the powers, role and authority of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources. The authority to approve forest management materials and to approve the estimated logging area is being taken away from the Ministry of Environment. This will be done by the State Forestry Agency. The agency, which now, instead of formulating an independent forest policy, is actually serving the State Enterprise “Forests of Ukraine”. Why is this? I don’t know. But a comparison of the salaries of the heads of these two institutions is very, very telling.
I would not be surprised if the Matusevychs come up with an initiative to eliminate the Ministry of the Environment altogether. It is strange that the head of the Ecological Committee, Oleh Bondarenko, and other members of the committee (except for Yulia Ovchynnykova and Olena Kryvoruchkina) do not understand this. And that with the liquidation of the ministry, the committee itself will become unnecessary.
No wonder that all the leading environmental NGOs have issued statements calling on MPs, heads of groups and factions to put an end to this draft law.
Now to the steppes. What do they have to do with it, if we are talking about a forest?
One of the articles of the law is dedicated to planting new forests. It is drilled into the public consciousness that planting forests is good and even noble. But this is not the case. Open spaces are also valuable – steppes, meadows, pastures, meadows. And it is important what exactly will be planted, because at the moment there is a wild bias in forestry towards alien species, towards introductions. That is why the current EIA law requires an assessment of new plantings (new plantings, not replanting of clearcuts) if the planting area is more than 20 hectares. Draft law 9516 would effectively remove plantations from the scope of EIA, as it would only require an assessment of plantations over 50 hectares. Given that there are practically no vacant plots now, and small pieces of land are planted, this will allow foresters to destroy steppes and pastures uncontrollably.
And we will have neither forest nor steppe
Oleh Lystopad, journalist, writer, communicator. Environmentalist. Retired officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine