The Sosnovka Coalition is a Russia-wide network of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that has been working on natural resource management issues for the past 5 years Sosnovka has met annually to consider a variety of forest management, fishery, cultural and oil and gas issues. This year, at its meeting in the Tunka National Park in Buryatiya, Sosnovka addressed mining as an area of major concern for the first time.
Mining in Siberia and the Russian Far East began in the 1800s and although it has been a source of valuable commercial goods, it has caused irreversible destruction to the biosphere and to human health. The most serious environmental problems associated with mining are in Buryatiya, Kamchatka, Magadan, Chukotka, Yakutiya and Krasnoyarskii Krai.
To address the issue within Sosnovka, a mining working group has been established. It has identified problems with projects undergoing government environmental ‘ekspertiza’ (expert reviews), especially with respect to public participation in discussing these projects, and the lack of independence of the state environmental monitoring and control service from the Ministry of Natural Resources. There are also major concerns about the reclamation of former mines (legacy sites) that are public health hazards.
The group has identified objectives, tasks and methods to deal with these issues. These include a long-term work plan to strengthen public capacity to moderate existing and planned environmentally dangerous mining activities.
The attendees at the meeting in September 2003 adopted the following resolution.
Through an exchange of information, mutual consultations, collective enquiries, appeals and other actions, the Mining Working Group proposes to:
1. continue public monitoring of environmental conditions during mining and during planning of new mines in Buryatiya, Kamchatka, Chukotka, Magadan, Yakutiya and Krasnoyarskii Krai;
2. support reclamation projects at former mines that are a public health hazard and that threaten the environment;
3. continue to lobby Russian Federation agencies on separation of the state environmental monitoring and control service from the Ministry of Natural Resources;
4. send appeals to the Russian Federation government environmental ‘ekspertiza’ service with a demand for compliance with the Rules on Environmental Impact Assessment;
5. let the public know how comments and recommendations from public environmental ‘ekspertiza’ are considered in government environmental ‘ekspertizas’. |
