Ukrainian Biosphere Reserves officials met in Lviv for sharing experiences and perspectives
by Mariana Verbovska
On Wednesday, February 16, for the first time in a long while, we held an offline meeting, where we shared our experience with representatives of Ukrainian biosphere reserves.
The event took place in Lviv at the Dnister Hotel. Our colleagues from the Michael Succow Foundation (Germany) and representatives of the German and Ukrainian ministries joined the meeting via zoom. During our event we not only delivered presentations of the pilot projects results from our partners – biosphere reserves "Desnyanskyi", "Roztochya", "Shatskyi", but also were glad to hear about the perspectives of the Chornobyl Radiation and Ecological Biosphere Reserve, the Askaniya-Nova Biosphere Reserve, the Carpathian and the Black Sea Biosphere Reserves, as well as the The East Carpathians Biosphere Reserve.
“I am extremely glad that we managed to get together representatives of biosphere reserves. As the legal status of these territories in Ukraine is not fully regulated, it was important for us to establish connection between all those biosphere reserves. Only together we could promote sustainable ecosystem management as the basis for future development of reserves’ territories and the whole country," – said Anatoliy Smaliychuk, country coordinator of the project.
We also held a public presentation of the video about our project with examples of implemented projects. You can watch it here.
On February 17, we continued our meeting with excursion to Roztochya Biosphere Reserve, where participants could see three examples of implemented projects:
- Rewetting and Restoration of Zalyvky Bog
- Establishment of Forest Shelters in the Area of “Adonis” Farm
- Recultivation of Anthropogenically Disturbed Lands as a Method of Adaptation
Additionally, we visited old-growth beech forests, which are part of the UNESCO World Natural Heritage site (forest between the villages Lelekhivka and Vereshchytsya – part of Roztochya Biosphere Reserve).
The project is implemented as a part of the International Climate Initiative (IKI). The Federal Ministry for Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) supports this initiative following the decision of the German Bundestag.
