Andrei Buldin, chairman of the Committee on Use of Natural Resources and Environmental Security, Legislative Assembly of the Krasnodar region

“Nobody has ever overruled Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: when there is no money for food, the environmental problems move to the background. Only when the socio-economic situation allows people to satisfy their material demands, they start thinking about the environment they live in, about the food they eat, etc.

“On the example of Krasnodar and other cities we can see that our society does want to care about the environment. As a result, environmentalist organizations appear in the region as public associations of activists and experts. The Krasnodar region has a very serious scientific ecological audience; Kuban academics have been recognized nationwide. It is natural that when discussing the environmental issues at the Expert Council of our Committee, we can hear very different opinions and approaches to the problems. The members of the Expert Council regularly receive draft laws developed by our Committee by email; then they propose their corrections and amendments and bring forward their conclusions.

“A recent example is the draft general plan of Krasnodar development that has evoked broad public discussion. Long before the public protests, our Committee had had serious questions to this document. The deputies of the Legislative Assembly developed a better balanced position - the draft general plan had had both negative and positive moments. Due to the public opinion, the draft plan was submitted for re-consideration. I hope that its new version will become much better.

“In 2017, the regional Ministry of Nature plans to open about a dozen new natural areas of preferential protection. The most important one will be the Anapa Breakwater - Kiziltash Lagoon, Veselovka and Blagoveshchenskaya villages. It took us a couple of years to coordinate the specific status of the area with a number of various competences, including federal Ministry of Nature Protection and even Ministry of Defence.”

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