Moscow - Aerospace monitoring has shown that the aggregate volume of illegally produced timber in Russia last year amounted to 1.02 million cubic meters, an official said.
A preliminary sum of forfeit to be demanded from forest fund users reached 1.77 billion roubles, deputy director of the Federal Agency for Forestry Mikhail Giryayev said.
The Agency monitored 101.2 million hectares of territory in 18 Russian regions in 2006, Giryayev said.
A press release by the Ministry of Natural Resources, received by Itar-Tass on Thursday, noted that the worst violations had been detected in the Krasnoyarsk territory, and the Irkutsk, Arkhangelsk, Tomsk and Chita regions.
In the Krasnoyarsk territory, specialists inspected more than 1,300 wood-cutting areas, where illegal cutting totaled 78,400 cubic meters. The estimated forfeit sum in the province made up 207.5 million roubles.
A similar situation was exposed in the Chita region where 27,300 cubic meters of timber had been produced illegally. Giryayev said logging licenses for wood-cutting areas under development are often backdated.
"It's a gross violation of forestry legislation. In addition, Chinese citizens are often employed in logging, who fell trees outside the bounds of the wood-cutting area," the official said.
Mikhail Giryayev underlined that the Federal Agency for Forestry is stepping up the stock-taking and monitoring of forest, following the transfer of the forest management function to regions.
This year, the Agency is planning to monitor 112 million hectares in 19 regions.