MOSCOW, October 4. /TASS/. Wildfire damage in Russia will reach about 19 bln rubles ($293.7 mln) this year, Deputy Head of the Federal Forestry Agency Mikhail Klinov told reporters on Friday.

"This year’s damage hasn’t been calculated yet. If we take last year, the damage stood at 19 bln rubles. I think, this year’s damage will be pretty much the same, though wildfires engulfed larger areas. However, it happened mostly in hard-to-reach areas, where firefighting activities cost less," Klinov pointed out.

On August 21, he announced damage from forest fires had reached seven bln rubles ($106 mln).

According to Klimov, fires affected about one percent of forests in Russia in 2019. The Forestry Agency said that the area engulfed in wildfires increased by 16% compared to 2018, reaching ten mln hectares. A total of 13,800 wildfires were recorded in the country during the fire season, most of them in the Far East and Siberia.

Notably, a reforestation law has been adopted in the country in accordance with the ‘Environment’ National Project, which stipulates that forest tenants must reforest every hectare of deforested land. Reforestation activities are particularly underway in the Moscow, Kaluga and Udmurt regions, as well as in Crimea, the Federal Forestry Agency pointed out.