FORESTS EVALUATION FOR TOURISM BY RECREATIONAL DIGRESSION STAGES
Nowadays forest recreational resources may be an important business sphere as there are many prerequisites for it. At the same time, the methods of forests assessment for recreational purposes are rather complicated. There are several trends in the methods of recreational assessment of plantations: territories assessment based on the landscape type, complex assessment of forests recreational potential in accordance with their beauty, comfort and sustainability, plantations state assessment in stages of recreational digression and system of economic assessment of recreational forests. The purpose of the research is to develop a scale of recreational assessment of stratums with due account for maximum permissible recreational loads for forest complexes. In the course of the research some standards of permissible recreational loads for south taiga zone and the zone of coniferous and broad-leaved forests were specified. A stage-differentiated principle of recreational digression stage was grounded. The coefficients for forest recreation capacity correcting in accordance with critical number of forest visitors were simulated on the base of actual number of tourists. The objects of the research are the most visited forests in the Republic of Mari El, the Republic of Tatarstan, Samara and Nizhny Novgorod oblasts, which are mainly represented by riverian forests and nature reserves. In the course of recreational digression staging definition and formalization of recreational load measure, the stage-differentiated principle is used. The principle helps to detalize forest loads in accordance with certain forest sites and to calculate number of tourists in different types of forest recreational areas on a case-by-case basis. Under the recreational projects development it includes usage of «Lesproekt» scales: «Stages Classification of Recreational Forests Digression», «Stages Classification of Recreational Digression of Protective Stands» (the classification allows to reveal loss of protective functions of forest stands in water protection and recreational forests of the Republic of Mari El and the Republic of Tatarstan), «Stages Classification of Recreational Digression of Shrub and Grass Cenosis» growing in the open landscape. All the scales let us reveal the stages of recreational regression and get an additional information about forests condition. In all the cases (particularly at the third, forth, etc. stages of regression) the obtained data on recreational load will be the basis for grounding of forestry and nature protection measures. In order to correct recreational capacity with an account of degraded territories, the recalculation coefficients in accordance with digression stages (0.99 for the I stage; 0.95 for the II stage; 0.90 for the III stage; 0.75 for the IV; 0.5 for the V stage) were applied. Coefficients are accorded with attendance of recreational zones and number of tourists. Upon the calculations, the necessary reduction in tourists related to trampling and degradation of forests make it possible to carry out the environment-oriented activities in a proper time.