Each year the state and society suffer millions of losses caused by illegal logging, and the illegal timber trafficking is one and a half times more than the legal sawmill activity.
The Better Regulation Delivery Office experts have repeatedly pointed out the need to address this issue.
The Head of the BRDO’s Agriculture sector Andriy Zablotskyi noted that society’s confidence in the forest industry is possible today only through the openness and transparency of logging data and the introduction of adequate timber trade.
That is why the initiatives of the BRDO Office have already been reflected in the decisions of the President of Ukraine, the Government, local authorities and the State Forestry Agency of Ukraine. In particular, on July 9, 2019, the President signed a Decree No.511/2019 “On Certain Measures for Forest Conservation and Rational Use of Forest Resources, and on July 17, the Government approved a Plan for the implementation of this Decree.
Yesterday the State Forestry Agency launched a pilot project of an e-register of timber harvesting and an online logging map. Residents of three regions of Ukraine (Chernihiv, Poltava and Rivne) can monitor the legality of timber cutting even today.
“With your phone, you can see the complete information about the type of logging performed nearby on the online map, as well as find a relevant permit for this logging (logging ticket) in a few clicks. And this is only the beginning of changes,” Andriy Zablotskyi said.
The timber market analysis conducted by BRDO experts is available here (in Ukrainian).