Country takes important steps towards 'safeguarding natural capital'
Article courtesy of WWF
Kyiv, Ukraine - WWF welcomes the recent establishment of 29 new protected areas, all within the past 10 months. A total of 38 protected areas have been designated over the past four years, including 32 National Nature Parks, two new Nature Reserves and four Local Reserves and Landscape Protected Areas, also eight biosphere reserves and national parks territories have been enlarged covering nearly 669,000 hectares. With these additions, Ukraine's protected area system now covers ca 3.7 million hectares, or approximately 5.5 percent of the country's territory.
"The designation of 29 new protected areas is a very significant achievement and a prudent step for securing Ukraine's prodigious natural treasures and the ecosystem goods and services that they provide," said Andreas Beckmann, director of the WWF Danube-Carpathian Programme.
TEEMING WITH LIFE: The Danube Delta, one of the world's most valuable wetland areas, is protected in the Ukrainian Danube Delta Biosphere Reserve. Photo: Anton Vorauer
Ukraine is home to tremendous natural treasures of European and even global significance. The primeval beech forests of the Carpathian Mountains that Ukraine shares with eastern Slovakia are listed on the
UNESCO list of World Heritage, as is the Danube Delta which Ukraine shares with Romania. These and other natural areas provide a host of ecosystem goods and services, including food and fiber, flood protection and carbon sequestration as well as growing opportunities for tourism and recreation.
The government of Ukraine has been gradually enlarging its network of protected areas. Among the more interesting new additions are the Syniohora, Cheremoshskyi and Verkhovynskyi nature parks in the Carpathian mountains, an area of over 30,000 hectares and Miotyda, Tuzlovski Lymany Nature parks on the seashores of the Azov and the Black Sea (near 50,000 hectares).
"Designating protected areas with a Presidential decree is the most efficient way of safeguarding our natural capital," said Bohdan Prots, senior project coordinator for WWF in Ukraine. "However, there will be significant challenges before effective management and protection for these areas is actually in place."
While applauding the significant expansion of Ukraine's protected area network, WWF draws attention to a number of pressures that are threatening even those areas that already enjoy some form of protection, including inappropriate or poorly planned infrastructure developments.
WILDERNESS REFUGE: A pine forest reaches the Danube bank near Wilkowo, Ukraine. Photo: Anton Verauer
Development of a
massive ski area at Bukovel - one of the 20 largest ski areas in the world - is increasingly threatening core areas of Gorgony National Nature Park, some key wilderness areas of Carpathian National Nature Park and critical important parts of regional ecological network.
Another cause for concern is the recent completion of the first phase of the
Bystroye Canal close to the core zone of the Danube Delta Biosphere Reserve despite criticism from WWF, the international community and Ukrainian organisations.
Contacts:
- Dr Bohdan Prots, Senior Project Coordinator for WWF in Ukraine, bohdan.prots@gmail.com, +38 0673 533 813
- Olga Apostolova, Regional Communications Officer, WWF Danube-Carpathian Programme, oapostolova@wwfdcp.bg, +359 885 727 862
