“Can you hear Baikal crying?”

The State Duma has authorized the clear cutting of the dead forest around Lake Baikal. This will affect at least four thousand hectares of forest (that is, 40 square kilometers - or almost six thousand football fields)

State Duma deputies at a meeting on December 9 adopted in the second and third readings a law allowing, under certain conditions, clear-cutting of forests in the area around Lake Baikal, RBC and Interfax reported. In the third reading, 323 deputies voted for the initiative, 71 deputies were against it.

The document states that in general, in the central ecological zone of the Baikal natural territory, it is prohibited to carry out clear cuttings on forest lands and specially protected natural areas.

However, clear felling of “dead forest plantations that have lost their environment-forming, water-protection, sanitary-hygienic, health-improving and other useful functions is possible,” Interfax writes. Clear cutting of dead forest is possible if selective cutting does not ensure its replacement with healthy forest, the law says.

In addition, the adopted law allows the transfer of forest fund lands to lands of other categories in order to build various facilities on them (if residents need them or for the operation of special economic zones), as well as to create new cemeteries or expand existing ones.

People in whose interests the land is being transferred are obliged to ensure forest restoration within three years, five times the area of ​​land excluded from the forest fund.

Deforestation will have to be approved by the Russian Academy of Sciences. The final decision will remain with the government

The law stipulated under what conditions clear cutting of dead forest or transfer of land from the forest fund around Lake Baikal would become possible.

• To begin with, a special commission will be created to ensure the protection of Lake Baikal and the socio-economic development of the Baikal natural territory. It will include State Duma deputies, senators, representatives of the presidential administration, government, FSB, senior officials of the Irkutsk region and Buryatia.
• The commission will agree on a list of areas for clear cutting or transfer of forest fund lands to lands of other categories.
• The commission will be able to consider the draft list of lands only after the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAN) gives a positive opinion.
• To consider the issue of land transfer, the commission must obtain the conclusion of the state environmental assessment.
• The final decision on clear-cutting will be made by the Russian government.

The head of Buryatia, Alexey Tsydenov, said that appropriate amendments are needed to repair roads, build treatment facilities, mudflow protection facilities, expand existing cemeteries, and create fire breaks. Governor of the Irkutsk region Igor Kobzev said that the law will allow a number of promising projects to be carried out in the region, including the construction of protection against mudflows.

When discussing the initiative, deputies referred to shamans and the Russian Academy of Sciences. And they called for preventing soil erosion

The State Duma discussed the law for almost two hours, RBC notes. Deputies were asked to reject 35 amendments (which they eventually did). The author or co-author of 31 of the 35 amendments, deputy Anatoly Greshnevikov from A Just Russia, said at the meeting that logging on Lake Baikal threatens the lake’s ecosystem: “Cutting is the way to shallowing rivers and lakes.”

The deputy noted that three of the five scientific councils of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, shamans and the Buddhist community in general, as well as the Russian Old Believers Church, opposed the adoption of the law. “Does this mean nothing to us?” - asked Greshnevikov.

The deputy added that the existing fire breaks on Lake Baikal were illegally built over with hotels, and they have not yet been demolished. He fears that hotels will be legalized after the law is passed. “Why are you all quiet? Can you hear Baikal crying? So he doesn’t want lumberjacks with axes to come to him,” added Greshnevikov.

Deputy Oleg Mikhailov from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, in turn, said that dead trees can be removed without clear cutting. For this, the existing mechanism for harvesting illiquid wood is sufficient. He noted that during clear-cutting, heavy equipment is used to transport wood, which leads to defragmentation of the forest and disturbance of the soil cover. According to the deputy, this can lead to soil erosion, especially on mountain slopes.

Mikhailov proposed adopting an amendment according to which forest restoration would be possible only in areas deprived of forest as a result of economic and other activities, in ways that prevent soil erosion.

Opponents of the law, including in the Russian Academy of Sciences, noted that clear cutting is not necessary

The bill on clear-cutting was submitted to the State Duma in June 2023, and a month later it was adopted in the first reading. When the document began to be prepared for the second reading, it was opposed by scientists, public figures and environmentalists, who said that the proposed changes threatened the Baikal ecosystem.

In September 2025, 87 scientists and ecologists, including 11 academicians of the Russian Academy of Sciences and 18 corresponding members of the Russian Academy of Sciences, called in an open letter to President Vladimir Putin to prevent the adoption of the bill in its current form.

The head of the Scientific Council on Forests of the Russian Academy of Sciences, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Natalya Lukina said on November 20 at a round table in the State Duma that the document being adopted contradicts other laws of Russia and the country’s international obligations, including the law on specially protected natural areas, on environmental protection, the Land and Forestry Codes.

Natalya Lukina noted that, according to Rosleskhoz, clear cutting will affect an area of ​​four thousand hectares where forest fires occurred in 2015. “We were convinced that without clear cuttings the problem could not be solved and the forest there would never recover. We analyzed these four thousand hectares. <…> What does the analysis of all remote sensing materials show now? It shows the following: that over these ten years, reforestation has occurred in these areas,” Lukina said.

Scientific director of the Institute of Water Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences, former Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources Viktor Danilov-Danilyan previously said that many problems of local residents can be solved with targeted measures without changing legislation.

"Jellyfish"