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17/10/2022

Křivoklátsko is a forest park.What about it?- Horydoly.cz - Outdoor Generation

Planting a tree on the meadow in front of Emilovna in the middle of the Krivoklat forests looked bizarre to the uninitiated.

Several dozen mostly uniformed people are standing on the grass a few meters from the road.

Green camisoles are ironed, with polished buttons and ceremoniously fastened. These indicate high forestry officials.

Work green clothes, slightly rolled up, sweater underneath, vest or jacket with many pockets on top. This is how local farmers and executive forest managers get to know each other.

Memorial oak near Emilovna

In the middle stands the Minister of Agriculture and several people in suits. At first glance, they are not very expensive, but they are not cheap either. We tip their wearers to be senior civil servants who occasionally become holdovers.

Among them are a few journalists in informal civilian clothes. Some are specialists in forestry and agriculture, others in tourism. Several civilians dressed in brightly colored shirts, jackets and casual trousers. They are press spokesmen, PR people and apparently also lobbyists.

The minister looks nervous, the music starts and a fanfare of French horns is heard. This is followed by a few meaningless phrases from several top mouths, the planting of a tree, the shoveling of dirt and other fanfare.

Expensive black cars arrive for the anointed heads, more ordinary ones for the less important and buses for ordinary people. In a few minutes, the tree stands on its own. I will definitely visit him in a few years to see how he is doing. The oak has enough strength and will survive many human swarms under its crown.

Sounds good. As if someone wanted to protect nature

Last year, the Ministry of the Environment announced a serious effort to declare Křivoklátsk a national park. Negotiations with municipalities have already taken place.

It would mean major complications for local residents, visitors and tourists. Forest management would also be heavily restricted.

The foresters led by the two largest owners of the local forests, the company Lesy ČR and the restitutor Jerome Colloredo-Mannsfeld, came up with a counter move. Together with the Czech Forestry Society, they founded the Křivoklátsko Forestry Park.

Sounds good, huh? Kind of official. There is also a feeling of nature conservation. After all, we all like nice forests.

But that's just empty nothingness. The Forest Park is not recognized by domestic legislation, nothing like this is common even abroad, and after all, it does not bind anyone to anything. It sounds good though.

Everyone knows what it is, only the minister denies it

It is widely believed that the park rangers have pushed their park to the public in order to limit or even stop the work to declare it a real national park.

The foresters talk about it among themselves as a fait accompli, as they painted it to the greens, and the greens, on the other hand, look at their initiative like a cuckoo's egg, but the leaders deny it.

"This and the following forest parks will serve as an example of forest management in the countryside," says Minister of Agriculture Jakub Šebesta. "The forest park does not prevent the creation of a national park."

However, in the very next sentence, he confirms: "Forest parks should demonstrate that the landscape can be effectively protected without tightening regulations." To make sure there is no doubt, he adds: "Perhaps someone is afraid that in time it will be found that the forest park sufficiently protects nature and there is no reason to establish a national park."

So we ask him whether the establishment of the Křivoklátsko forestry park is a political ploy against the planned national park. "I'm not sure whether the declaration of a national park is a political issue," breathes Minister Jakub Šebesta, and immediately adds: "Unlike it, the Forestry Park is a bottom-up initiative. Quite possibly, it will be difficult to find a reason to increase nature protection if the Forestry Park ensures it park."

Finally, he asks two theatrical questions to which he does not wait for an answer: "Is it wrong? Are we doing well?"

It's not about nature. We want to promote foresters

We turn to Miroslav Pech, the chairman of the Křivoklát branch of the Czech Forestry Society, what specifically will the forest park bring to nature in Křivoklátsk compared to the existing protected landscape area and biosphere reserve.

"Forestry is not presented as it should be, and Lesnický Park will change that," is Miroslav Pech's main argument. "A number of forestry activities are perceived by the public in a very negative way, and therefore we are committed to management using the highest standards."

Minister Jakub Šebesta is said to be sorry that the farmer and forester is considered a pest of nature. "I don't know any reason why they should be unkind to the environment in which they live and work."

Forest Miroslav Pecha adds that the Forest Park has no impact on the state budget, whereas a hundred million crowns would have to go to the national park. According to him, forest management and employment will remain. Municipalities will retain the possibility of joint decision-making on forests and all existing powers. "We maintain the full administration of the municipalities and do not enter into their powers."

The Křivoklátsko Forestry Park remains under the jurisdiction of the Křivoklátsko Protected Landscape Area by law.

Křivoklátsko is a forest park. What of it ? - Horydoly.cz - Outdoor Generation

The president is said to know Křivoklátsko and warns of the risk

Let's add what President Václav Klaus wrote about the establishment of the forest park: "(...) I got to know the natural wealth of the Křívoklát forests long before I began to stay more regularly at the castle in Lány as the president of the republic. the more I watched with concern the discussions about the possible declaration of a national park on the territory of the Křivoklát forests. ...the declaration of the so-called Forest Park is a counterweight to the efforts to conserve Křivoklátsko by means of the declaration of a non-interventional national park. I would like to believe it, but I am not convinced that the supporters of the declaration of a national park the park will be satisfied with this state in the long term. There is a risk that Lesnický Park will become an intermediate step to the declaration of the already mentioned national park. Please be well aware of this risk. (...)"

Owner of a substantial part of the Krivoklatsk forests and co-declarant of the forest park, Jerome Colloredo-Mannsfeld, writes this: "(...) I have a very positive view of establishing a forest park as an alternative project to the emphatically rejected original efforts and efforts for a national park. ...I don't see no urgent need to change something in the treatment of nature... (...)"

Show the place Turistika on a larger map

Let's imagine the three sides of the trench war for control of the forests in the whole of the Czech Republic. We can guess that neither of them is completely clean, honest and does not play fair with the public.

Protectors of nature

Seemingly, conservationists are pulling the best end of the rope. They are represented by the Ministry of the Environment. They want the best for nature, to let it develop on its own, not to interfere in its processes and to limit man's influence on it.

That sounds good. Perhaps even usefully and sensibly. But the green officials put too much pressure on the saw. They took up the fight in many places at once, taking as allies environmental activists, out-of-the-ordinary lunatics, professional quarrelers and also the bureaucratic machinery.

They have gone so far that the majority of the population of the Czech Republic sincerely hates them, they are worried about the forests destroyed by bark beetles, they are defending the cultural landscape under the whip of senseless conservation orders and prohibitions, and they also do not like the unconcealed liberal political orientation of the Green Party, with which nature conservationists identify with.

This front is primarily personified by former Minister of the Environment Martin Bursík, senior green official František Pelc and in Křivoklátsk the head of the protected landscape area Petr Hůla.

Forest managers

They are not in the public eye as much as the rangers. Yet they are more powerful. They don't speak the language of politics, but they know the language of money well. They are woodsmen. Forest owners, their managers, hunters and forest personnel.

Most officials fall for them, because they are either paid, or they are simply less able to navigate the demands of the protectors than the foresters. The first talks about ecosystems, niches, non-productive functions of the forest and the rights of all living organisms on Earth. Others want to harvest wood and perhaps occasionally reforest.

The foresters have as their allies the hunters, whom they hate in the forest, but they can push decently in the parliament, the fishermen, which is the same song in pale blue, but also, for example, the mining, mining and concrete lobby, which do not like protection laws nature.

This warfront is only open to access forest farming profits. They don't fight with gloves here, corruption of gigantic proportions flourishes and citizens lose not only a lot of money, but also natural wealth.

For example, the minister of agriculture and long-time director of the agricultural and food inspection Jakub Šebesta, the head of the company Lesy České republiky Svatopluk Sýkora, who has for the time being replaced several of his hastily dismissed predecessors, are visibly kicking for the foresters.

Local self-government

Local people intervene only marginally in disputes between nature conservationists and foresters. Mostly these are lone screams. Only occasionally a petition is signed somewhere, the village revolts, or the region makes a fuss.

However, local self-government plays a very important role as a tipping point. Whoever the mayors and, by extension, public opinion sides with, has the upper hand.

Just a few years ago, municipalities welcomed new national parks and protected landscape areas on their territory. They hoped for subsidies and increased tourism. However, neither of them really came. Just a year ago, green officials were able to convince local governments that without agreeing to conservation requirements, they would not receive money for development and, after all, for operation.

This year, however, the citizens of some municipalities got together, connected with other communities via the Internet and defied not only their municipalities, but also green officials. The weight on the scale pan seems to be subtly shifting to the woodsmen.

The problem with municipalities is that their councils often don't know who's who, they're not interested in politics, they don't understand the games that conservationists and foresters play with them. However, this is a better case. In the worst case, the mayors and their representatives are corrupt. Only some make decisions according to the wishes of the citizens and in their interests.

For many years, Jan Zahradník, the governor of the South Bohemian Region, was a symbol of the fight against nature conservationists in Šumava, but now the head of the Club of Czech Tourists, Jan Stráský, is slowly taking his place. The municipality that was able to resist the pressure of officials and will not become part of the expanded national park České Švýcarsko is Tisá.