Rural Development and Natural Resource Management policies in SEE Towards the European Integration
Status of the Forest Governance and Forest Management Policies in Kosovo
Qazim Kukalaj
Tahir Ahmeti
Pristine, May, 2016 Avdulla Nishori1
KOSOVO OVERVIEW
Kosovo has a central geographical
position in the Balkan Peninsula. It
lies between 41°50’58 “and 43°
51’42”of north geographical
latitude and 20°01’30” and
21°48’02” of east geographical
longitude. Kosovo has a total area of
10,887 km²,with about
1,820,631million inhabitants and the
average density of around 167
inhabitant’s per square km².
FOREST AREA AND LAND OWNERSHIP – OVERVIEW
During 2012/13, an inventory of Kosovo’s forests was completed. General
data as a result of this process can be summarized as follows:
Overall forest areas and forestry land is calculated to be around 481,000
hectares or 45% of total territory of Kosovo, or about 0.27 hectares per
capita.
The total growing stock of Kosovo’s forest it’s around 40 milion m³
Area of bare forests is between 20 000 – 30 000 ha.
Forest management institutions need to take care of these lands and
enables realistic planning of forestation and proper selection of seedlings
( species site matching).
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Land Structure in Kosovo
4
5
Forest types
Coppice forest...
Degraded forest
High forest.
Mixed forest
Other forest
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
Series1 61 13 17 7 2
1 2 3 4 5
Graph 1. Area, mean growing stock and annual forest increment by tree species and
ownership( ha, m³,%)
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The National Forest Inventory found that 959 000 m³ was harvested every
year. Annual increment of trees with dbh>= 7 cm. almost balances the annual
harvesting which has been calculated to be around 1.56 mil. m³ vs.1.60 mil. m³
Age class ( years)
Without trees
Coniferous Broadleaved Mixed Unknown
0-20 3,800 1,000 121,000
20-40 4,200 104,800 400
40-60 5,200 66,600 1,400
60-80 4,200 36,800 800
80-100 2,000 11,800 200
100-120 1,000 5,400
120-140 1,200 4,200
140-160
160-180 200
180-200 200
No data 4,200 200 2,400 77,400
Total 8,000 19,000 353,400 2,800 77,400
Table.1. Forest area by age and tree species structure (ha)
Table 2.Kosovo growing stock in 1000 m³ on 2002 and 2012 per tree species
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PROTECTED AREAS IN KOSOVO, ACCORDING TO IUCN
Protection category IUCN No. of
Protected zones
Surface (ha) %
Natural reserves I 11 698.40 0.56
National Parks II 2 116,957.00 94.16
Natural monuments III 38 4,868.00 3.92
Protected landscape IV 2 1,681.00 1.36
Total: 52 124,204.40 100.00
Table 3. Number of protected zones in Kosovo
The new laws on National Parks are promulgated by Kosovo Assamble.
There are more than 2,000 species of endemic species in the forest of
“Sharri Park” and 26 of them are involved in the Red List of IUCN
threatened plants.
Based on U.S. EPA one acre ( 0.4 0 ha.) of trees ( on marginal land
would sequester 0.6 to 1.6 metric tons of carbon annually in the first
five years of growth.
Assuming that one hectare of trees sequester about 2.47 ton of carbon
each year and that 1.0 ton of carbon is contained in 3.67 tons of CO2
The forest and forest land area of Kosovo of 468, 800 ha will sequester
(save, reduce, or prevent from escape to the atmosphere) about 464, 800
ha x 2.47 t/C= 1,148,056 t/C or 1,148,056 x 3.67 = 4,213,365.52 CO₂
Calculation of the amount of fForest Carbon sequestration in Kosovo
Year Baseline 1 (t Co₂) Baseline 2 (t CO₂ )
2003 4,375,978 645,974
2004 4,442,789 610,468
2005 4,716,819 815,714
2006 4,786,711 779,988
2007 4,905,477 951,366
2008 5,061,366 884,924
2009 5,230,909 950,098
2010 5,435,864 1,049,843
1011 5,522,212 1,083,926
2012 5,623,672 1,140,902
2013 5,751,193 1,172,485
2014 5,897,243 1,232,863
2015 6,020,700 1,284,419
2016 6,142,173 1,333,262
2017 6,265,734 1,382,621
2018 6,388,580 1,428,095
2019 6,538,274 1,488,460
2020 6,661,770 1,537,683
Source: Climate protection strategy in the forest sector in Kosovo
Baseline Carbon emissions /removal by sink (2003-2020)
Main existing forest laws and strategies
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Green Book”, May 2003;
Agricultural and Rural Development Plan 2007-2013;
Agricultural and Rural Development Plan 2009-2013;
Agricultural and Rural Development Plan 2010- 2013;
Strategy for Game Management in Kosovo, 21.10.2003 and
Document on Policies and Development Strategies of Forestry Sector
in Kosovo 2010-2020.
Necessary amendments to the New Draft Law on Forests
1. Forest property decentralization reforms ( denationalization, restitutions
and privatization).
2. Land destination of low quality agricultural lands, overgrown with
bushes
3. Forestry law harmonisation with laws of other related ministries,
especially with the Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning
(MESP),
Ministry of Economic Development (MED) and Ministry of Trade and
Industry
4. Law harmonization with EU and other Regional and World Forestry
Directives, Conventions, Regulation and with linked legal instruments
especially with EU Forest Law Enforcement , Governance and Trade
(FLEGT) Action Plan
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Assessment of wood residues as wood biomass potential
Region Area Volume/ha Tot Volume m³
1. Peja 103.746 1.06 109.951
2. Ferizaj 46.983 0.70 33.040
3. Gjilan 57.344 0.62 35.404
4. Mitrovice 94.261 0.88 83.417
5. Prizren 67.714 0.38 25.800
6. Prishtina 80.294 0.56 45.046
Total: 464.800 0.71 332.658
There are no forest residues regulation in place nor organisation and management structure
GENRAL PRINCIPLES OF THE KOSOVO FOREST POLICY
Some general principles of forest management are determined by the Law
on Kosovo's Forests 2003/3
Article 3 - Kosovo aspires to manage its forests in accord with the statement
of principles for a global consensus on the management, conservation, and
sustainable development of all types of forests set forth in Annex III to the
Report of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development
(Rio de Janeiro, 3-14, June 1992), including the precautionary principle,
conservation of biological diversity, the principle of intergenerational equity
and ecologically sustainable development
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Policy and Strategy Paper on Forestry Sector Development in Kosovo 2010 – 2020
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Rural Development through the
project GCP/KOS/004/SWE- SIDA and FAO produced Policy and Strategy
Paper on Forestry Sector of Kosovo, 2010-2020.
Strategy” has analysed the role of the Government of Kosovo in developing
the sector with special emphasis on the importance of understanding of the:
economic, social and environmental role of the sector, to continue the
analysis with development and strengthening of institutional and regulatory
framework, development of modern management of forests, consolidation of
forestry land, management of protected zones, cooperation with line
ministries and cross-sectorial cooperation on other issues. 16
Main forestry strategy findings
The main institution responsible for forestry issues, Kosovo Forestry Agency
(KFA) was established based on an UNMIK regulation of 2000 as Kosovo’s
Forestry Authority and it was transformed into Kosovo’s Forestry Agency in
2003, and it still face numerous challenges such as:
Lack of staff competence, lack of funds and resources, overlapping mandates
and responsible, unclear roles, inadequate planning and inadequate control
and monitoring.
According to this document, the listed weaknesses produce the following:
Lack of collection of sub-optimal revenues from selling logging products,
Logging permits in some cases are based on informal criteria.
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Non-use of forest residues, especially where illegal logging takes place etc.
Wood market is not fully transparent and it does not promote an efficient
market for sound business;
Forest management does not take place consistently, which leads to
reduction of productivity and reduction of the value of standing logs, and
Forests were not protected from fires, diseases and pests.
Kosovo still lack of concrete forestry policies in the following segments:
Setting of policies for forest and forest land privatization (denationalization,
restitution or another form).
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Kosovo National Development Strategy (2016- 2021)
The Government of Kosovo has produced National Development Strategy
The forestry objective in the “PLAN” is defined towards prevention of the
deforestation in Kosovo, and give a restart afforestation and sustainable use,
for the benefit of consumers and industrial sector.
The concrete activities of the measure defined in the “ Plan” stated as:
1.Forestation of degraded forest areas, recovery of fire-damaged forests and
implementation of preventive protective measures.
2) Enforcement of tougher sanctions against illegal loggers, which requires
better institutional setup, legal amendment and strengthening capacities of
Kosovo Forest Agency ( KFA) and introduction of a forest information system
for integrated protection.
3) Develop forest management plans for the all public forest areas by 2020. 19
POLICY INTERVENTIONS IN PRIORITIZED AREAS – STRATEGY PROPOSAL
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Forest Sector Progress Report 2014 - 2015
Implementation of activities in 2014 and 2015
Forest Management
1. Capacity development: Forest Laboratory in Peja Forestry Institute, was
inaugurated on 15 October 2014.
Kosovo Forest In-formation System was developed as an IT tool to cover the
KFA needs in carrying out its forest management mandate.
2. Plantation management
A National Afforestation and Reforestation Program 2016 – 2025 was
prepared in 2014 and completed in 2015.
The Afforestation Pro-gramme identifies 101,656 hectares as land suitable
for planting under an afforesta-tion program and a total of 7,448 hectares
has been identified as being suited for immediate reforestation.10
Non-use of forest residues, especially where illegal logging takes
place etc.
Monitoring of forestry health
Non-use of forest residues, especially where illegal logging takes place etc.
The National Forest Health Programme 2016 - 2025 was finalised in 2015.
Supported by FAO.
The objective of the Kosovo National Forest Health Program ( NFHP) is to
enable establishment of an efficient and functional Forest Health Service
( FHS), which can provide reliable data on current physiological condition
of Kosovo’s forests, assess the level of damage and changes to forest
ecosystems due to the impact of biotic and abiotic factors, advice on forest
health related topics and, whenever necessary, undertake preventive and
suppressive measures.22
Other activities outlined in the progress report
Tending of young forests
Treatment of forest – Forest fires treatment , silvicultural activities (
thinning, cleaning, pruning, road construction, marketing of wood mass
Aforestation of bare land –Average annual aforestation of 400 hectares
Growing of forest seedlings in forestry nursery in Peja
Forest education and training – No activities carried out
Higher forestry education- No activities reported
Awareness raising – Communication and Information Strategy for the
Forestry Sector in Kosovo 2010-2020, was prepared and approved in year
2014-th.
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Forest environmental protection –Training on planning of
afforestation and reforestation
Privatisation of Socially Owned Forest Enterprises – Process
is not completed
Support to Forest Owner associations – CNVP/SIDA project
has supported organisation of forest owner’s association
Training in entrepreneurship- No activities reported
Wood processing - No significant activities reported
Bioenergy production – On 2015-th the WISDOM ( Woodfuel
Interpreted Supply and Demand Overview Mapping report
for Kosovo was officially published .
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Forest land consolidation- No activities reported
Forest Inventory – Second Kosovo forest inventory is completed on 2013-th
Illegal wood logging -The problem of forest damage through
illegal cutting is of concern ,
Activities are mainly focused on confiscation illegally
harvested wood material, punishment of illegally wood
cutters, and other executive measures , without undertaken
any preventive measure in direction of solving the demands
of population for the wood material.
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Summary of indentified constraints and problems
Lac of stakeholder participation in decision making (participation approach )
Lack of subsidies for forestry and nature conservation, especially to private forest
owners
Lack of forest codification
Wood industry in Kosovo acts separately from the forestry sector, with most wood
being imported;
Land tenure – Private forest ownership is highly fragmented, forest owners are poorly
organised
Lac of competency of Government Forest intuitions - Kosovo Forest Agency (
Executive Agency), Forest Department ( Regulatory and policy making body),
municipalities are responsible bodies for forest protection.
Decisions based on bottom - up approach 26
Development of strategies, legal framework, programs, plans ,
capacity building and other activities continua's to be based on “
donor driven “ approach
The value of forest and wood industry products still are undervalued
Political culture is in the transition.
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Thank you for your attention