Almost 85% of the total area of wildfires is accounted for by 5 Russian regions in 2016

Of these, there are the Republic of Buryatia, the Krasnoyarsk Region and Trans-Baikal Territory, the Irkutsk and Amur Regions.

The head of the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources Sergey Donskoy gave these data while opening a teleconference with regional authorities on the wildfire season results 2016 and the missions for 2017.

The meeting was held on December 6, 2016 in the Government of the Russian Federation.

“Although the wildfire season 2016 was marked by an improvement in the fire hazardous situation as compared to 2015, the analysis of the effectiveness of measures to prevent and extinguish wildfires showed that many regions have not taken comprehensive measures, emphasized the Minister. The reasons are in the unsatisfactory work of the Commission for the Emergency Response in the Republic of Buryatia, the Trans-Baikal Territory and the Irkutsk Region, weakness in terms of the organization of the interdepartmental cooperation in these regions and in the Amur Region”. Sergey Donskoy noted that due to such discoordination there were numerous cases of fire spread to the forest reserve lands.

“I hope, we can learn even from our mistakes, if we are not able to learn from others,” said the minister, addressing the heads of the constituents of Russia subjects to the agenda of the preparations for the wildfire season 2017.

Since the beginning of the wildfire season 2016, 11 025 wildfires on the area of ​​2 465.6 thousand hectares have been recorded on the territory of the Russian Federation. These figures, according to the Federal Forestry Agency, are in all respects better than in last year: below the five-year average by 1.5 times in number and correspond to the fire covered area.

The positive trends are outlined on the lands of the specially protected natural reservations. The Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Russian Federation, the Head of the Federal Forestry Agency Ivan Valentik, in particular, noted that thanks to the set of organizational and financial measures taken by the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources, the area covered by fire on the lands of the specially protected natural reservations is reduced by half in 2016.

In general, according to Ivan Valentik, despite the budgetary constraints, in 2016 more than 20 billion rubles were given to the Russian Federation subjects for exercise of forestry powers. The total amount of federal funding for activities related to the prevention and suppression of wildfires has been maintained. In this case the limits for the protection of forests from fires, which are 4.1 billion rubles, were transferred to the regions before the fire season started. Another 648.7 million rubles were additionally transferred during the fire season from the unappropriated reserve of the Federal Forestry Agency.

Of great importance also is the fact that in 2016 the federal Forestry Agency and the constituents of the Siberian and Far Eastern Federal Districts have made an agreement on cooperation in the field of forest protection against fires. In 2017 such headquarters will work in all federal districts.

In addition, the work for forest firefighting management has been arranged in a consistent manner: 3874.1 km of forest roads were built and 6116 km were reconstructed.

“The damage caused by wildfires this year is decreased by 3.8 times and, according to preliminary data, it is 15 billion rubles. This season we have adequately dealt with fire situations also thanks to everyone's attention to the problem of wildfires. The instructions were given by the Russian President and the two Vice-Prime Ministers of the Russian Federation,” summarized Ivan Valentik.