Romania’s Environment Min. allots funds for virgin forest inventory

Romania's Ministry of Environment has drafted a decision through which it allocates RON 2.58 million (EUR 573,000) for an inventory of virgin and quasi-virgin forests in Romania. The money will come from the Environment Fund and will be used to finance a study on the identification of forests in Romania that will be included in the National Catalogue of Virgin and Quasi-Virgin Forests. The study will determine which of Romania’s forest areas remained untouched and meet the criteria to be strictly protected by being included in the National Catalogue. Environmental organization Greenpeace has been advocating to get the Government to take further steps for protecting the virgin forests in Romania. The organization even started an online petition (in Romanian and English), which gathered thousands of signatures. “The Romanian Carpathians are home to the largest virgin forests in the temperate zone of the European Union. The virgin and quasi-virgin forests disappear because of ignorance and lack of commitment to their value, or due to immoral interventions and illegal logging. Greenpeace estimates that, as a result, Romania has lost almost half of its virgin and quasi-virgin forests in the last decade,” reads a statement from Greenpeace. The National Catalogue of Virgin and Quasi-Virgin Forests is the legal instrument that establishes the identification criteria, the inclusion procedure, and the protection measures. In September this year, American actor and environmentalist Leonardo DiCaprio posted a photo and a message on his Instagram account to support the Greenpeace activists’ efforts to preserve Romania’s last remaining virgin forests. Greenpeace: 985 hectares of virgin forests destroyed in Romania’s Fagaras Mountains Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com