Bulgarian Biodiversity Foundation Annual report 2011 Sofia, December 2011 As a nongovernmental organization, registered with the public benefit, every year BBF presented in the Ministry of Justice a report for its activities and financial situation. Now we are introducing you the Annual report for 2011. The opposite side of the book presented the report in Bulgarian language. The preparation and printing of the Annual report is in the frame of BBF project "Cooperation for biodiversity conservation and sustainable local development in the Strandja Mountain", which is implementing with the financial support of Norway, Island and Lichtenstein through the Financial mechanism of the European Economic Area. I. THE CONTEXT In 2011 Bulgaria continues to be considered the most particularly deserving of praise for the preparation and corrupt European country, according to the Transparency adoption of this Act. The activities and campaigning of the International report. 'Let Nature Remain in Bulgaria' coalition and, in particular, The year started with the eavesdropping scandal involving the BBF, resulted in the removal of all debatable provisions the Prime Minister and high-level government officials for construction in the exchanged forest areas, was protecting the operations of certain companies. removed from the draft Act. The examples of examples of state forests replacement transactions in the past and the A new election code aiming to introduce uniform strict subsequent signals of penalty risks have shown that good election rules in Bulgaria was adopted to as a result of the management of the forestry sector is a matter of political lack of capacity, legislative gaps and vote purchasing. The will. presidential elections and the local authority elections in October were qualified as the most manipulated elections since 1990. Despite these findings, the election results have improved substantially the situation in some of the BBF areas of operation. There is a new Mayor in the town of Tsarevo whom we know well from his work as an official of the forestry system and as a WWF volunteer. Malko Tarnovo also has a new Mayor who 'extended' a hand to the Strandja NPD during the very first week in an effort to start work- style changing talks. Alas, this is not the situation with the new Mayor of Bansko, whose pre-election statements make him a firm supporter of continued building in the Pirin National Park. The Mayor of Petrich, a former supporter of In a complete contrast with the above, and under pressure the Belasitsa Nature Park, was elected for a third time. The by monopoly interests, the Council of Ministers approved a Mayor of Kyustendil was elected for a second term. The draft Act on the amendments of the Forestry Act alleviating Mayor of Kavarna, however, will be in office for a third term. the construction in forests for the skiing industry without Following the signals sent by the BBF and by the 'Let change of the purpose of the lands, even those in protected Nature Remain in Bulgaria' coalition of more than year ago, areas such as the Vitosha Nature Park. The legislative the Minister of Environment and Water declared for the first changes provide also for increased logging and change time the results from the investigation of the actual area of the hunting periods by the Minister of Agriculture and used by the Bansko Skiing Zone concessionaire in the Pirin Forests alone. The proposed amendments in the Act were National Park. The results have confirmed our concerns adopted by the Council of Ministers without compliance that 65 ha are used in addition to the 95 ha submitted by with the public hearing deadline requirements during the concession to the company of Yulen AD. The practice of celebrations between Christmas and New Year. Despite various state subsidies being provided for the development the impossibly short deadlines, the BBF and its coalition of ski sports in breach of the objectives of protection of this partners organised a press-conference and sent their UNESCO world heritage site is still under way. opinions on the Draft Act. The Ministry of Agriculture and A new Forestry Act was adopted during the International Foods started a process to remove certain nature park Forest Year regulating the use of the forests and the directors without explicit provision for such a procedure economic benefits for their owners which are the state, in the law. municipalities, natural persons or legal entities. This Act Amendments of the Hunting Act of 2010 allowed the is the result of active discussions and text-writing work Executive Forestry Agency to lease state game breeding by the Government, the MPs and the non-governmental sections, including those in protected areas, to private organizations. Mr. Georgi Kostov, acting as a Deputy companies and users in 2011, which has given rise to Minister of Agriculture and Foods, demanding actively a series of problems of biodiversity conservation and cooperation with non-government organisations, is tourism development in these regions and presents Bulgarian Biodeversity Foundation 3 dangers such as use of poisons against predators, closing Plan, which is yet another demonstration of the desire of of roads, intensified use, threatened security of tourists the Ministry's leadership to finalize the adoption of this key and restriction of their access. This is especially true of the document. Strandja Nature Park. The tender procedures and provision by the Government of multiple permits for exploration of oil and gas deposits in the aquatic area along the Southern Black Sea coastline and in Northern Bulgaria without environmental assessment and assessment of the compatibility with the objectives of Natura 2000 were the cause of significant public interest. Such permits have been issued to the Leberdel company for exploration in the Black Sea opposite the Irakli and Strandja areas, and to Chevron for exploration of the shale gas deposits. Mass public opposition grew into regular public protests and processions. The BBF and other non- In reaction to the outbreak of foot and mouth disease in governmental organizations took measures to appeal, Strandja, the Government decided to construct a new through the courts, against the Council of Ministers' border facility along the entire boundary between Bulgaria decisions issued without the procedures required by the and Turkey - 270 km in total. This project, if implemented, environmental legislation. will amount to the construction of a new 'iron curtain' in National mapping of the Natura 2000 zones was started the region and will be a barrier not only to wild animals in 2011 under a project of the Ministry of Environment but also to the local people. Also, enormous areas of the and Water. The study involved almost the entire scientific Strandja Nature Park and other protected areas and Natura potential of Bulgaria. The insufficient capacity and short 2000 sites will be destroyed. implementation deadlines mean that the results may be In January, the BBF received officially the decision of the incomplete and insufficient which will threaten any further MOEW to update the Strandja Nature Park Management effective management of the Natura 2000 network. ІІ. THE BBF IN 2011 ТThis year has been good, but also difficult for the BBF - two new babies and several new members have joined the Foundation team, but the difficulties in project management and adequate financing have increased as well. One very important theme for the BBF, which was also part of the public and media agenda, was Pirin. Dissolution of the Bansko skiing area concession agreement, rehabilitation of the illegally used areas and seeking of criminal responsibility of the guilty parties. These are some of the demands of the eco-organisations raising their voice against the Bansko skiing area concession, which has been illegally expanded by 65 ha. This has incurred losses for the state of BGN 22 million. Another hot topic which we worked on during this year was the intention to extract shale gas in the sea and in Dobrudja. Ever since the beginning of 2011, the BBF has been involved in the campaign jointly with the Tsarevo Municipality and with other sea-side municipalities opposing the Government in its decision to allow extraction of shale gas because of the enormous risks of destruction of sea-side tourism and pollution of the drinking water of Dobrudja – the only water source in the area, pollution of fertile soils and endangering of human health. The biodiversity and protected areas coordinator of the Foundation, Stefan Avramov, has become known for his demand for verification of the lawfulness of the financing, and of its origins, of President 4 Annual report 2011 Parvanov's hunting hobby. Avramov requested inspection of whether the hunting is paid for from the president's budget intended for financing of his activities as head of state, or is not paid at all. These demands received wide media coverage, the President commented many times that there is nothing illegal in his activities, and the Minister of Agriculture and Foods, Miroslav Naidenov, started a lightning-fast counter initiative that Bulgaria's President and Prime Minister should be allowed free hunting quotas since hunting is part of the protocol. BBF was also a partner of BlueLink and of the German Institute of Regional Geography in organising of the National Conference of Environmental Organisations in Bulgaria on May 13-14. For the first time since 2003, the Conference convened the nature conservation stakeholders and allowed them to discuss Bulgaria's most important and hot environmental problems in several working groups. BBF has been very active at the regional level as well, especially in the Burgas and the Belasitsa areas. We have two large projects under way in the Burgas area (Strandja and the Burgas lakes) and we have a very successful partnership with the Strandja Nature Park Directorate, with the BSPB and with the Burgas Municipality.