On February 27, 2007, Russia's Natural Resources Minister Trutnev chaired the first meeting of the Forestry Board (Lesnaya Kollegia) at the President Hotel in Moscow, Russia. This is a newly established consultative body including representatives of federal and regional executive and legislative bodies, industry, NGOs, academia, and professional associations. The body is set up to review, on a regular (bimonthly or more frequent) basis, the emerging issues of implementation of the new Forest Code of the Russian Federation and spell out recommendations for the development of the National Forest Policy.
The Minister's opening statement and the presentation by Mr. Roshchupkin, Chief, Federal Forestry Agency, are posted (in Russian) at the MNR site:
http://www.mnr.gov.ru/part/?act=more&id=3263&pid=11
http://www.mnr.gov.ru/part/?act=more&id=3265&pid=11
All participants of the meeting received in their handouts a CD with various draft regulations currently under preparation for Government and Ministerial approval, as required by the provisions of the new Forest Code. The MNR has asked all interested parties to submit specific comments and recommendations for improvements of these drafts by March 10, 2007. The contents of this handout CD (all in Russian) are available for download as a zip file (3.6 MB) at http://WBLN0018.worldbank.org/ECA/ForestryAR/DocLib.nsf/By+Date/B2F92A6AF7B17F13852572900043B95C
The Forestry Board will have a working secretariat composed of Mr. Dmitry Albertovich Loktev (MNR) and Mr. Stanislav Vasilyevich Starostin (Federal Forestry Agency). The next meeting of the MNR Forestry Board is proposed to be held during the last week of March to review comments to the package of draft regulations.