Monitoring report of old growth forest changes in the Ukrainian Carpathians for October 2021

In October, the experts of the ForestCom NGO continued to monitor officially recognized and state protected old growth forest areas in the Ukrainian Carpathians (shown in Figure 1) using the latest published Sentinel-2 satellite images.

Fig. 1. Situation of officially recognized old growth forest areas accepted ForestCom for monitoring in October 2021

The results of the assessment of changes in the forest cover of the recently established monitoring system “DEEP GREEN UKRAINE” (deepforest.org.ua) were used for the analysis. A total of 2877 areas were identified where forest cover changes took place in October on the territory of all Ukrainian Carpathians. These areas were compared with 735  shape files of the old growth forest areas identified in accordance with the Ukrainian legislation (natural forests, quasi-virgin forests and virgin forests), which were taken by ForestCom for research this time. As a result the forest cover changes were detected on the border with quasi-virgin forest in a compartment 55, subcompartment 2 of Maidanske Forestry of Deliatyn State Forest Enterprise (see Fig. 2).

Fig. 2. The result of remote sensing monitoring of identified forest cover changes in old growth forest canopy against the background of the recent satellite image Sentinel-2. Yellow area shows the place of loss, possibly on the territory of a protected site or right on the border 

Discovered changes required field observations (verification) in order to identify possible violations of existing legislation on the protection of virgin, quasi-virgin and natural forests. During the field monitoring of this area, the ForestCom experts recorded signs of logging on the border with a quasi-virgin forest, in its buffer zone. Read more about the results of the survey here: .

It should be noted that in October, 735 forest plots were taken under monitoring by ForestCom team, which have the legally established status of “virgin, quasi-virgin and natural forests” on the territory of 4 oblasts: Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zakarpattia and Chernivtsi. The total monitoring area is 10,406 ha, which is about 60% of all available officially designated areas.

    This NGO “ForestCom” activity is supported by the US Forest Service International Programs