These are findings of experts of the International charitable organization “Environment-People-Law” (EPL) who studied the ATO zone using MODIS2 data and Scanex technology3. The research is continuation of EPL’s work in the field of analysis of consequences of military actions for the environment in the ATO zone. Military actions are powerful factors of impact on the environment and environmental safety of people. Currently relevant executive authorities do not perform such research, and therefore experts from the public took over this initiative. As communicated earlier, during the ATO period about 3000 fires have been reported. The next stage of this research is finding out the area covered by fires.
- “The results we obtained are mathematical models rather than exact borders of each fire but they with great likelihood illustrate quantitative indices and show the landscapes affected by fires”, says EPL’s executive director Olena Kravchenko.
- “We calculated the total area of territories affected by fires in the ATO zone during June-September 2014. The total area of such territories is 297 006 ha, which is 17 % of the total area of forests, steppes and fields in the ATO zone”, added environmentalist Kateryna Norenko.
It has been calculated that 39745,59 ha of forests have been destroyed by fire, which is 17,3% of forests area in the ATO zone and 13,38% of total area of territories affected by fires; 110215,8 ha of steppes (23,7% of the area of steppes in the ATO zone and 37,1 % of total area of territories affected by fires); 147044,56 ha of arable lands, which is 14,08 % of total area of arable lands and 49,5 % of territories affected by fire.
“Special emphasis should be put on scales of damage to forests, the burning of which unlike the burning of fields and steppe entails considerable economic losses, – says the expert Oleksiy Vasyliuk. – It is important to mention that we speak about the steppe zone characterized by special climate. Under current conditions, creation of new forests in this zone is extremely complicated, survival rate of young forests is very low and during the first year after planting more than a half of planted trees perish. It means that under current conditions it is next to impossible to plant new forests in the steppe zone. Therefore, loss of forests as a result of fires in the ATO zone almost certainly means impossibility to recover these forests in future.”
“Majority of forests around settlements were created in the past with the aim to form a microclimate that is more humid and cooler than natural climate of steppe zone”, adds environmentalist Petro Tiestov. – “Loss of forests inevitably causes deterioration of conditions of people’s living”.
It is worth mentioning that the research showed that fires also had damaged territories of protected areas, in particular a branch of Luhansk nature reserve “Provallia steppe” and wildlife sanctuaries Naholchanskyi, Volnukhinskyi, Bilorichenskyi, Luhanskyi, Perevalskyi and Pishchanyi. EPL experts will communicate further results of the research in upcoming releases.
For further information please contact:
Kateryna Norenko, EPL environmentalist
Email: kateryna.norenko@gmail.com; office@epl.org.ua
Oleksiy Vasyliuk, EPL environmentalist
Email: vasyliuk@gmail.com; office@epl.org.ua
tel.: 097-1000-473
Petro Tiestov, EPL environmentalist
