Forests and forestry science in Armenia: research needs and areas

H.Y.SAYADYAN Dr. of Science (Geography)

Prof. of Forestry and Agro-Ecology Departments Armenian National Agrarian University

E-mail: hovik.sayadyan71@gmail.com

KAZAN, 18-21 November, 2014

Armenian Forest Estate

State Forest Estate

459.900

Forests soil

392.300

Non forests soil

67.600

Forested areas

334.100

Non-forested

areas 58.200

•Arable land -1100ha

•Hay-making area-5800ha

•Pasture lands-29.900ha

•Water surface-500ha

•Vineyards and fruit orchards-

2900ha

•Roads -700ha

•Settlements-2800ha

•Sandy areas-600ha

•Other land-uses-23.300ha

•NWFP-700t(pear),

150t(apple),600t(cornelian

cherry), 60t (nut)-Ijevan

• Artificial plantings-36.900ha

• Canopy un-closed plantings-

13.400ha

• Forest nurseries-300ha

• Scarce forest areas-1900ha

• Cut, non-reconstructed areas-

200ha,

• Open lands-16.700ha

ARMENIAN FORESTS

Oak

35%

Beech

29%

Hornbeam

17%

Pine

5%

Juniperous

3%

Other

11%

•Area-334,100ha (around 11 %)

•standing volume- 41,74 mln.m3

•mean annual growth - 0,45 mln.m3

•loggings -0,7-1,0 mln (1992-2000s)

•mean resources per ha - 125 m3

•mean annual growth - 1,3 m3

•mean bonitet - III-6

•mean canopy closure - 0,53

•mean age - 99

Tree Species Structure

Illegal cuttings in

Dilijan Nat.Park

Fire trace

HIGHLIGHTED ISSUES IN ARMENIAN FORESTRY TO BE ADDRESSED

•Inappropriate management structure and week responsibility for national forest resources, •Former extensive conservation practice vs. current wrong management approaches •Inappropriate FLEGT and REDD activities

•Deforestation due to illegal logging, overgrazing, dry climate ,

•Lack of struggle against pests, insects and fungi in the forestry,

•Degradation of xerofil bushes specially in southern aspects,

•Illegal and irregular cuttings specially during last 2 decades

•Lack of transparency and participatory approach, lack of

will to work and to use funds and resources together, lack

of professionals

Overgrazing everywhere in Armenia

The planet’s 25 most diverse and endangered hotspots (IUCN)

NEED 1. Address high conservation value of Armenian forests:

Valuation of forest ecosystem services!

DIFFERENT LANDSCAPES ARE HOSTING VERY DIVERSE FLORA AND FAUNA

Specially protected areas in Armenia

Khosrov state reserve, 1958

(Funded in 4th cent. A.D.)

Specially protected areas occupies

around 11 % of national territory

with the water surface of lake Sevan

Erebuni state reserve Wild relatives of cereals,1989

Shikahogh state reserve, 1958

•5 National parks

•3 State reserves

•23 State reservations

•Several natural monuments

•The project to establish

First Bioreservat in

Armenia is on-going

(supported by KfW

foundation)

Dilijan National

Park

Caucasian mesophile forest

ecosystems, 2002

STRUCTURES RELATED TO FOREST SECTOR AT MINISTRY OF

AGRICULTURE

Ministry of Agriculture

Forest Monitoring

Centre Armforest

Forest

Policy

Reforestation

and inventory

Developm

programs

Armforest is composed by central office

in Yerevan and 22 regional forest

enterprises. Armforest is responsible for

overall management of forest estate.

Forest monitoring centre is young

structure, where there is high

demand to skilled professional

foresters

In Armforest central office staff is 52 and

in regional forest enterprises 1135-1175

both permanent and seasonal employees

Plant breed.,

forestry and

plant protect

Agency

NEED 2. Improve the governance and management of Armenian forests!

STRUCTURES RELATED TO FOREST SECTOR AT MINISTRY OF

NATURE PROTECTION

Ministry of Nature Protection

Bio-resources managment agency

Forest Research-

Experimental Centre

National parks,

reservations, arboreta

Inspectoriate

• Forest Inventory

• Forest Management Plans

• In-serviceTraining

• Research works

• Field Experiments

Protection and management

of 25% forest area of Armenia

Inspection of

utilization of

natural resources

Out of 192 employees only 11% have some formal forest education

NEED 3. IMPROVE FORESTRY EDUCATION AND RESEARCH ITSELF

PREVIOUS EDUCATION AND RESEARCH (before 1991)

• Formal education and training of few Armenian foresters in Russia, Ukrain and Georgia (1930-1991)

• Armenian forest research-experimental station of Vanadzor (1929)

• Forestry courses at Armenian Agricultural Institute (1950s)

• Forestry division in Botanical Institute of NAS RA with experimental stations

• Research works in State forest service on reforestation and afforestation

CURRENT EDUCATION AND RESEARCH (1991 and onward)

• Forestry courses at Armenian Agricultural Academy (1994-2003)

• Establishment of Forestry Depart.at Armenian Agricultural Academy in 2004:

–New education program with stress on forest inventory, reforestation and forest establishment, forest conservation and protection

–Balance between theory and practice

–Corresponding material-technical bases, reference library

•Conduction of limited forestry related resaerch activities on the following areas:

–Global climate change impact of forest extent , forest fires and quality

–Forest management improvement through application of GIS, RS, monitoring

–FLEGT and REDD studies, Illegal logging impact studies

NEED 4, IMPROVE EFFECTIVENESS OF INTERNATION FORESTRY PROJECTS

• Armenian Tree Project (since 1994)

• UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Technical Co-operation Projects (TCP), 1995/1996

• Forest Resources Assessment of Armenia (Swedish Goverment)- 1997-1999

• The assessment of genetic resources of Armenian Forests (Rome-IPGRI)-2000

• Forest Stewdership Council. First steps towards Forest Certification in Armenia (Pro-forest, UK)-2000

• Forest Inventory in Northern Armenia by support of Ntaional Goverment- 2000-2002

• World Bank-IDA-GEF-SIDA-2002-2008 Natural Resources Management and Poverty Alleviation

• (SLU-SIDA)-2002-2007- Forest education project in Armenian Agricultural Academy (now Arm. State Agr. University)

• First community forest in Armenia, Tufenkyan Foundation,

• Reforestation and forest development fund-Govermental decision N891, June, 2004

• Japan Government Reforestation /Afforestation project

• FAO, Forest Nursery re-establishment

NEED 5: PROPER FOREST INFORMATION SYSTEM

Period Forest

covered area

in ha

Forest cover

in % from the

total area

Standing

volume in

1000 m3

Standing

volume in

ha/m3

4000 to 1, B.C. appx. 1050 000 35 - -

XVII - XVIII appx. 530 000 18 - -

1941, Maghakyan 284 379 9,6 - -

1960, Abrahamyan 241 753 8,1 24 839 102,7

1966, National

Forest Inventory

253 000 8,5 29 700 117,4

1977, Makhatadze 273 000 9,2 27 892 102,2

1978, National

Forest Inventory

296 600 9,98 31 140 105

1988, National

Forest Inventory

334 100 11,2 41 740 124.9

2000, Assessment appx. 245 000 8,2 28 000 116,6

2010, FAO, World’s

forests, 2011, ets.

262 000 9,0-12,4 % 31 400 120,0

NEED 6: CASE OF LAKE SEVAN ARTIFICIAL FORESTS SEVAN ISLAND - 1940S

SEVAN PENINSULA-1988

SEVAN ISLAND, 1937

SEVAN PENINSULA, 2010

The island and the monastery of

Sevan during the 19th century

(Paris, 1869, T. Deyrolle)

SECTION OF ARTIFICIAL FOREST SUBMERGED BY RISING WATERS OF LAKE SEVAN

FORESTS AROUND LAKE SEVAN ARE NOT MANAGED PROPERLY

NEED 7: Study of Negative Events Related to Non-regulated Forest Logging and Forest Management (e.g. Landslides)

NEED 8: Study of Negative Events Related to Non-regulated Forest Logging (e.g. high stand forest conversion into low stand forests)

NEED 9: Modeling of Idealized flow of deforestation

NEED10 :REFORESTATION, AFFORESTATION AND GREENING

Estimating the Extent of Forest Cover in Armenia

Using Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper (ETM+) Data

Example of Research work

scattered juniper and oak

orchards mixed with natural vegetation

natural forest

recently

cleared

areas

tree-line

natural forest

recently

cleared

area

FOREST COVER OF ARMENIA FOR IV-I MILLENIUM B.C.

AND 17-18 CENTURIES PERIODS

FOREST COVER OF ARMENIA IN 1990 AND 2000

Methodology

• ERDAS Imagine 9.0 was used to perform classification of the images

• Each pixel is assigned to a class based on information from the bands

Data Processing

• Four sets of images from 2000 and 2001 were downloaded

• “GeoCover” format is already orthorectified

• Each image set consists of six “bands” covering different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum

• Each set of bands was combined into a single scene

Four Landsat scenes cover Armenia

Image Classification

• Decision was made to use “supervised classification”

• Each of the four images was classified separately

• Output is a thematic map of land cover classes

• The maximum likelihood algorithm was used

Jensen, 2005

Image Classification (continued)

• Training samples were

collected using the

“seed tool”

• The training samples

define a signature

corresponding to a

particular class

• Three classes were

defined: forest, water,

and other

Accuracy Assessment

• ERDAS Imagine was used

to generate random points

Soviet-era topographic

maps were used to

assign reference values

to random points

No funds available for

traditional ground-truthing

Path/Row

Date

Class Producer’s

Accuracy

(%)

User’s

Accuracy

(%)

Overall Accuracy

P168R033

Aug 2001

forest

other

80.65

97.46

89.29

94.26

93.33%

P169R032

Jun 2001

forest

water

other

71.43

100.00

99.14

93.75

100.00

95.04

95.33%

P170R031

Jun 2001

forest

other

81.63

98.02

95.24

91.67

92.67%

P170R032

Aug 2000

forest

water

other

80.00

80.00

97.60

84.21

100.00

96.06

94.67%

Statistics generated by Accuracy Assessment Module

Spot checking in the field

showed a high degree of

accuracy at discriminating

forest from non-forest

…into a final mosaic.

Total area was then calculated

Impacts of Socio-Economic Policies on the Forests

Sayadyan H. and R. Moreno-S. 2006. Forest policies,

management and conservation in Soviet (1920-1991)

and post-Soviet (1991-2005) Armenia. Environmental

Conservation 33(1):1-13.

Historical Forest Cover Estimates

Moreno-Sanchez, R. and H. Sayadyan. 2005. Evolution

of the forest cover in Armenia. International Forestry

Review 7(2): 113-127

Concluding remarks and questions

• It’s evident that research works and scientific publications are

important to highlight environmental problems, particularly for the

forests and attract attention at list some part of society

(scientists, NGOs, sometimes authorities and local

administration)

• The open question is: How to make large public involved in vitally

important forestry issues and “struggle” for their rights of healthy

and safe environment?

– E.g. Governments’ sometime easily allocated forest patches to

foreign companies under mining industry (copper, gold, iron,

uranium) or construction purposes

• How to make large public to have a feeling of “ownership” of

country’s forest resources and escape from the “Tragedy of

commons” inherited from recent historical past?

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION