MOSCOW, February 28. /TASS/. Russia's forestry inventory authority, Roslesinforg, inspected forests in the national Arctic zone to report on the Day of Arctic, marked on Tuesday, that forests cover the third part of the Arctic zone, the authority told TASS.
"The area of the Arctic forests is more than 328 million hectares (3.28 million square kilometers), where about a half - 159 million hectares (1.5 million square kilometers) - is covered with trees and shrubs, thus we can say that a third part of Russia's entire Arctic zone is forests. Most Arctic forests [are] in the Krasnoyarsk Region, Yakutia and on the Yamal (Peninsula)," the report reads.
In the Krasnoyarsk Region's Arctic zone, forests occupy 67.8 million hectares. In Yakutia's 13 Arctic municipalities, trees and shrubs grow on 54.3 million hectares. The Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Region with its 16 million hectares of trees and shrubs closes the list of top three regions in terms of forest resources, and it is followed by the Murmansk Region with 5.4 million hectares, Chukotka with 4.9 million hectares, the Komi Region's Arctic zone with 3.7 million hectares, Karelia's Arctic zone with 3.7 million hectares, the Arkhangelsk Region with 1.3 million hectares, and the Nenets Autonomous Region, where trees and shrubs grow on 190,500 hectares.
"Over the years of the state forest inventory, Roslesinforg has studied in detail the breeds on the entire territory of those regions that were fully within the Arctic zone," the authority quoted its Director Pavel Chashchin as saying. "The studies have found that in all four regions (the Chukotka, Yamal, Nenets, Murmansk Regions) conifers are more numerous than hardwoods, and the difference in areas can range from 2.7 times (as it in the Murmansk Region) to 24 times (as in the Nenets Autonomous Region). Shrubs are also typical for Arctic landscapes. The total stock of tree and shrub species in these four regions is estimated at 2 billion cubic meters."
Oldest trees in Russian Federation
The Arctic zone is also known as a place where the country's oldest trees grow. Trees in Chukotka are the record holders - their average age is 134 years. The average age of the forest in the Nenets Autonomous Region is 130 years, in the Murmansk Region - 124 years, and in the Yamalo-Nenets Region - 112 years.
The Arctic forests have a special mission - to maintain the natural balance, the authority stressed. Since the Arctic zone is the area of tundra, and forest restoration is difficult there, logging is outlawed in the Arctic. Chukotka and the Nenets Autonomous Region have announced forests are protected, and any wood may be used by residents only for their own needs. Forests grow naturally. For example, in the Murmansk Region, in 2021, the area of land covered with forest increased. Thus, the amount of absorbed carbon dioxide within a year exceeds its annual losses due to a few loggings or wildfires. The total carbon stock, according to the authority, in the Yamal, Chukotka, Nenets and Murmansk Regions is more than 545 million tons.