About 30 Ukrainian and German members of the bilateral Project Steering Group (PSG) of the SFI-Project “Technical Support to Forest Policy Development and National Forest Inventory Implementation” (SFI) met 21.07.2023 at the premises of State Forest Management Planning Association (SFMPA) in Irpin, (close to Kyiv) in order to discuss SFI-Project implementation progress and to approve project activity plans.
Oleksandr Krasnolutskyi, First Deputy Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine (MEPR) – head of Ukrainian delegation – emphasised the negative impact of the Russian war on forestry in Ukraine. MEPR is aiming to implement the Forest Strategy till 2035 and the National Forest Inventory (NFI) in particular. He thanked for the consultancy advice and financial assistance provided by the German Government.
Stefan Wagner, Assistant Desk Officer, Department for European and International Forest Policy at the Federal Ministry for Food and Agriculture (BMEL) -head of German delegation – stressed that the German Government through the SFI-Project supports Ukrainian partners in the difficult war time, by allocating funds for material and technical equipment to continue NFI as remote sensing-based forest inventory of all Ukraine (RS-Inventory) as well as by further consultancy advice.
Bernd Wippel, unique land use GmbH, Head of Forestry Department and Volker Sasse, SFI-Project leader, who participated in the event at the spot in Irpin, reported in details about SFI achievements and activity plans. PSG welcomed recent SFI-Project activities in general, particularly the procurements of cars and equipment of field inventory work, financial support on NFI field data gathering as well as consultancy advice provided by national and international experts.
Viktor Melnychenko, General director of SFMPA, informed about progress of the NFI field surveys. The SFI-Project supports the collection of forest resource information from additional 650 plots by end 2023.
Viktor Myroniuk, SFI expert, presented the approach and preliminary results of the RS-Inventory for Sumy Oblast. Till end 2023 major SFI resources will be spent on the implementation of the RS-Inventory, which allows to estimate forest resources of all Ukrainian territories in shorter period, comparing this with a traditional NFI.
Based on the outcomes and experiences with the RS-Inventory the SFI-Project foresees elaboration of two concepts studies until March/April 2024 on:
- Scenario analysis of potential timber supply in Ukraine until 2050
- Further development of NFI/RS-Inventory methodology and implementation
PSG strongly recommended to coordinate all SFI-Activities more closely with all Ukrainian partners, particularly with the State Forest Resource Agency. Due to the changes in implementation condition, SFI-Project also was requested to circulate an adjusted draft Project Log Frame among PSG members.
