Information found in the official data management system “Ozols” about potential – rather than designated – specially protected habitats has come as a very unpleasant surprise to the forestry sector. Businesses regard it as a highly dangerous precedent, the scale of whose impact on the national economy has yet to be assessed.

There are said to be a considerable number of such areas – “potential habitats” – and this gives certified timber producers well-founded concerns about their scope for using wood resources from forest areas running to many tens of thousands, and possibly even hundreds of thousands, of hectares. The move is seen as an unexpected blow to one of the most important assets of one of Latvia's most competitive export sectors – its source of raw material – delivered by a state body (not by foreign competitors) which, it should not be forgotten, is itself maintained out of the taxes earned and paid by the companies of that very sector. Forestry businesses are astonished that something “potential” is being placed in an official database owned by the Latvian state, since by the same logic a similar section could be introduced in other databases too. Several private forest owners admitted that they are not entirely sure how to proceed, because legally they could “take out” a felling licence and thereby render the “potential specially protected habitat” non-existent; yet for any self-respecting landowner such a course of action is unacceptable, while no willingness has been observed on the part of the state and its responsible institutions to meet owners halfway over withdrawing these “potential” areas from economic use. That said, it does not mean there could not be situations in which the forest areas in question, containing a “potential specially protected habitat”, will after a while have to be redefined as places where a potential specially protected habitat once historically existed.

One view expressed was that the inclusion of “potential specially protected habitats” in the official database must be assessed in terms of its impact on the national economy, on jobs in the regions, on the amount of tax paid and on export earnings – all the more so when the state coffers lack the money to fund services important to society and various scenarios for raising tax rates have already been aired. Industry representatives acknowledge that things cannot go on as they have been: change is needed, and its principal aim must be to create prosperity for the people living in this country, which can be achieved by creating favourable conditions rather than by deliberately creating burdens or obstacles for everyone who invests in manufacturing export-capable products and providing export-capable services. Those who create these additional burdens and obstacles, meanwhile, should be regarded as a threat to the state and its inhabitants.

In the view of these businesses, it is neither ethical nor proper to “put forest owners in handcuffs” with lists of potential specially protected habitats in an official state database, because it may affect the willingness of buyers of wood products to purchase them from Latvia, which in turn will be felt in both employment and the amount of tax paid.

The legal status of the “potential” is not understood

Modris Fokerots, one of the largest private forest owners in Latvia, was taken aback by the fact that the nature data management system “Ozols”, which includes all micro-reserves – specially protected areas – now also lists potential specially protected habitats.

“I'd be interested to know which Latvian law defines what a potential specially protected habitat is. Is economic activity permitted in such a place or not? Are property tax relief or any compensation payments envisaged for a potential restricted area too?” M. Fokerots asks one question after another. In his view, if the concept of the “potential” is set out in laws passed by the Saeima and in Cabinet of Ministers regulations, that is one story. But if it is not, and someone “off their own bat” inserts such a section into an official database of national importance, then a serious question arises about responsibility for the possible consequences of such action.

“I don't know whether the term ‘potential' can be used in official databases at all,” M. Fokerots wonders. In his view, using the term “potential” in this way, when it is neither explained nor defined, is quite literally provoking foresters and the businesses working in the sector. “If there are already potential specially protected habitats, that is a precedent. It follows that we may assume every driver could be a potential breaker of the road traffic regulations, every taxpayer a potential tax evader; likewise there could be potential defaulters on maintenance payments, potential perpetrators of various crimes and so on. In fact, almost everyone living in the country could be entered in an appropriate register with the note ‘potential',” M. Fokerots remarks with harsh irony.

An unacceptable precedent

“It is unacceptable that any sort of fairy tale or daydream can be attached to perfectly normal things, and that those who do so bear no financial or any other kind of responsibility for it, either towards the national economy as a whole or towards the companies operating in particular regions,” says Andis Araks, vice-president of the Latvian Forest Industry Federation and chairman of the board of SIA “Krauzers”, in a sharp assessment of the situation. In his view, following such logic one can invent anything: “It is hard to work and plan for future development if we start living with that kind of thinking.” A. Araks points out that in every company those who take decisions answer for the result, and it should be exactly the same in the public sector

Costs for certified operators

Jānis Švirksts, board member of the forestry certification company SIA “BM Certification”, notes that the presence of “potential specially protected habitats” in an official database will mean additional problems for certified companies, stressing: “They will have to spend time and resources surveying and assessing the areas of potential specially protected habitats.” There are quite a lot of such areas, which gives certified timber producers well-founded concerns about their scope for using wood resources from them. “The presence of mature stands within the potential specially protected habitats section is very extensive, and the concerns are justified,” J. Švirksts concludes. In his view, the question cannot be answered before an actual survey in the field. “I cannot rule out such situations,” J. Švirksts replies when asked whether foreign buyers of wood products might refuse to purchase products that could contain timber obtained from areas of potential specially protected habitats.

Latvia's problem – its uniqueness

“Latvia differs from many places in the world and in Europe, because we have few people but a great deal of forest and countryside. There are on average around 2 ha of forest for every inhabitant of Latvia, and consequently there are a great many natural assets here of a kind that Europe may once have had, but of which very little or nothing at all remains elsewhere,” M. Fokerots explains, concluding: “Here in Latvia we don't really know what to do with these European natural assets, because with us they may be found at almost every step, whereas in Western Europe, for example, they may exist as isolated specimens and are therefore considered a specially protected rarity.” In his view, a very serious problem in Latvia is the uncertainty over who it will be (which institution, which people) that sets the criterion for how many of these natural assets we (in Latvia) need.

“Sooner or later someone will have to take responsibility and make some sort of decision,” M. Fokerots reckons, adding that the first step should be to state how many sites in Latvia in total correspond to natural assets of European importance (what area they cover), and then to work out what to do with them. “I fear that decision-makers may not have a clear and comprehensible picture of the real situation, unlike those who assessed and visited the sites in question in reality – out in the field,” M. Fokerots says. He allows that “putting” potential specially protected habitats into the nature data management system “Ozols” may be a way of gauging how many such assets there are and deciding how to act. M. Fokerots believes it would have been more logical to introduce a section in “Ozols” called “nature census results” rather than the section “potential specially protected habitats”, which so provokes foresters. “Compared with the economically developed countries of Western Europe, Latvia is essentially a kind of nature reserve. Only... what will the people living here live on?” M. Fokerots asks rhetorically, pointing out that there is a risk of “falling” into the trap that arises between Latvian and European conditions.

“For example, if in Latvia a pine grows until it is 100 years old and only then may it be felled, elsewhere in Europe a 100-year-old pine is already a protected natural asset and must not be touched. Will we no longer be able to fell a pine in Latvia ‘on grounds of age'?” M. Fokerots explains when asked to give a specific example. He is prepared not to fell trees and not to harvest forests (in which case there would be no need to plant young stands) if he were paid an adequate sum (compensation) for it. “There is a beautiful 140-year-old pine forest with magnificent mast pines, with no undergrowth, and in a few decades' time this stand will begin to die off, because a tree's life is not endless. As a result, nobody will get anything – no money for the forest owner, no roundwood for timber producers, no jobs in the district and no taxes paid to the state,” M. Fokerots says, analysing the situation.

A planning tool, not a restriction tool

Elīna Ezeriņa, head of the Communications and Nature Education Division of the Nature Conservation Agency, explains:

“When the Nature Conservation Agency (DAP) project “Nature Census” began and an ever greater volume of data on Latvia's natural assets accumulated, particularly on habitats of EU importance, forestry companies came to appreciate the DAP nature data management system “Ozols” (DDPS) and began to use it more and more, gradually shifting their risk assessments of natural assets onto the nature data published in the DDPS. For companies' convenience, DAP introduced a special map printing tool showing the natural assets (protected areas, micro-reserves, habitats of EU importance, species localities) that could potentially be affected by forestry activity.

During the “Nature Census”, the map printing tool displayed information both on habitats of EU importance that had already been mapped and on forest areas where mapping was still under way (that is, “potential habitats (being mapped)”, or the compulsory survey layer). Once the project was completed, only those areas corresponding to habitats of EU importance appeared in the map printouts, as there was no current need to update the processed dataset on stands subject to compulsory survey.

As the identification of habitats of EU importance has now been completed, but nothing in nature stands still, and as various large projects are currently being advanced that could significantly affect the forest environment and its biological diversity, a need arose to identify, in addition to the information on the habitats of EU importance already recorded, other forest areas that are important for biological diversity. That is why the dataset in question, which was once used in the “Nature Census”, was updated. When the dataset was updated, the new information, or processed dataset, appeared in the map printouts used by certified forestry companies.

The Agency stresses that, as regards forestry activity, companies are themselves entitled to determine their own risks and criteria for identifying valuable stands (for example, alternative risk mitigation measures developed by experts), while the Agency provides the data and processed datasets at its disposal as information available to society as a whole.
We emphasise that these data are intended for use in nature conservation planning and do not impose any ban on forestry activity in particular stands. It is for the forest owner and manager to decide whether and how such information is used – whether areas with high biological diversity potential are voluntarily protected and managed with the aim of increasing biological diversity, or whether such areas are used for economic purposes.

At the same time, we hear that certain forestry companies are using the information published in the DDPS to urge forest owners to harvest their stands sooner, frightening them with the prospect of new mapping of habitats of EU importance. The Agency points out that no new identification of habitats of EU importance is planned.”