ASSESSMENT OF THE CONTRIBUTION OF RUSSIAN FORESTS TO CLIMATE CHANGE RISK REDUCTION AND ITS IMPACTS
Fulfillment by Russia of its commitments under the Paris Agreement on Climate requires that the full contribution and maximum utilization of carbon sequestration potential of Russian forests are taken into account. However, the absence in Russia - unlike leading countries worldwide - of a reliable, time-tested forest inventory system is a significant factor hindering the development of sustainable use of forest resources and ensuring full accounting of greenhouse gas uptake by forests. As a result, even the quantitative assessment of current and retrospective forest carbon budgets is a rather complicated methodological task, the features of which are described in the article. For this reason, the role of vast forest areas of Russia as an important factor of its sustainable socio-economic development, its most valuable resource and advantage in de-carbonization of the economic complex and in general to mitigate the problem of climate change and its consequences does not mean by itself an automatic realization of this unique potential and its transformation into enhanced sustainability and competitiveness of the domestic economy. The article considers system measures contributing to significant improvement in the quality of accounting and assessment of the absorption capacity of Russian forests as a key element of the mechanism of industrial greenhouse gas emission compensation, and recognition by the global expert community of the contribution of these forests to solve the global climate change problem. It is emphasized that these measures are an organic part of the reform of public policy in the field of forest management, including the discussed initiatives in the field of bioeconomy, which aims to reproduce the full range of eco-system services of forests.