Virgin Komi Forests

Several groups of Indigenous reindeer herders live in and around the property, including the Komi. The relationship between Indigenous groups and park management is generally good, but there are recurring tensions related to mining and its impacts on the park, and in particular on its rivers. Several NGO groups representing local Indigenous people against the Chudnoe gold mining operation, including the Save the Pechora Committee, the Congress of the Komi People, and the Izvatas Public Movement, have opposed large-scale gold mining due to its likely negative effects on the tundra ecosystem and reindeer pastures that are the basis of their traditional livelihoods. The views of these Indigenous groups were not considered when the gold mining area was excluded from the Yugyd Va National Park (Debonnet et al., 2010). However, the recent Integrated Management Plan for the period 2017-2030 for the site is to be implemented jointly with local Administrations and in partnership with a number of local organizations (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2019), albeit none of the aforementioned organizations who have previously raised concerns. Since the 2020 outlook assessment, no new information has been found.

The site is governed by national protected area legislation, in particular the federal law “On environmental protection” dating back to 1991 but updated in 2002, and the federal law “On specially protected natural areas” of 1995. The first law defines the standards for environmental quality, makes provisions for the protection of biota and provides a basis for federal protected areas and activities permitted in them. The protected area law regulates the organization, protection and use of protected areas. This legislation recognizes different types of protected areas such as at the federal level strict nature reserves, national parks and nature monuments and the regional level nature parks, nature reserves and nature monuments (Debonnet et al., 2010). The two protected areas that make up the property are Yugyd Va National Park (YVNP) to the North and the Pechoro-Illychsky Strict nature Reserve (PISNR) to the South. PISNR is a federal protected area benefiting from a strict protection regime with no economic uses are allowed. The PISNR buffer zone on its southern and western boundary, which is also part of the World Heritage Site, benefits from the same high protection status guaranteed under federal law. YVNP, established in 1994, is also a federal protected area with the status of National Park, corresponding to IUCN protected area category II. The national park has different zones with different land use regimes. YVNP also possesses a buffer zone along its western border, but established under regional law. As a result, the federal national park authorities do not have the authority to actively manage the buffer zone. The Russian Federation currently lacks a framework law to define the unified management of World Heritage sites. The recent Federal Law No. 365-FZ on “Special economic zones in the Russian Federation” further weakens the legal basis for effective conservation of protected areas, though it is not currently applied to the site (UNESCO, 2012). In 2008, the national boundaries of Yugyd Va National Park were changed to exclude four areas, including the Chudnoe gold mining area, from the site. As a result, a significant part of the site has been lacking the legal protection required by the World Heritage Convention Operational Guidelines, which critically undermines the integrity of the site (Debonnet et al., 2010; UNESCO, 2012). In August 2013, however, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared inoperative Order No. 3 of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology which constituted the basis for the boundary changes of the Yugyd Va National Park, thereby confirming the original boundaries of the park which coincide with the northern part of the World Heritage site (UNESCO, 2014).

The governance is shared by the federal and regional authorities. Implementation of the Integrated Management Plan for the period 2017-2030 is carried out jointly with the Republican Center for Specially Protected Natural Territories, local Administrations and in partnership with public environment-oriented organizations.

While there is limited information available on the level of integration of the World Heritage site into regional and national planning systems, the development of a major gold mining operation within the site prior to inscription and the time that has passed since with little progress towards successfully and unequivocally removing mining activity and licensing from the site (UNESCO, 2016 and 2018) strongly suggests that the objective of “conservation and management of the values of the site”, required by the World Heritage Convention Operational Guidelines, is not sufficiently integrated and mainstreamed into regional and national planning systems, particularly those dealing with mineral extraction planning.

Two separate protected areas make up the Virgin Komi Forests World Heritage Site:
• Yugyd Va National Park (YVNP) (IUCN category II) to the North: it has a buffer zone established under regional law
• Pechoro-Illychsky Strict nature Reserve (PISNR) to the South (IUCN category I). In 2022, the area adjacent to the reserve from the south, which is also part of the property, was given the status of a buffer zone of the reserve (federal level).

The original boundaries of the site were considered appropriate (IUCN, 1995), although a number of potential additions to the site has been identified including the Upper Illych Basin forest located between the two component protected areas of the property, an eastern buffer zone, the PL350 enclave on the western boundary of YVNP, and the Unia Basin south of PISNR (Debonnet et al., 2010). However, on 18 January 2012, changes to the national boundaries of Yugyd Va National Park were approved, which excluded four areas, including the Chudnoe gold mining area, from the national park (while these boundary changes take effect at a national level, they do not alter the international boundaries of the World Heritage Site). As a result, a significant part of the site lacks the legal protection required by the World Heritage Convention Operational Guidelines, which critically undermines the integrity of the site (Debonnet et al., 2010; UNESCO, 2012). In August 2013, however, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared inoperative Order No. 3 of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology which constituted the basis for the boundary changes of the Yugyd Va National Park, thereby confirming the original boundaries of the park which coincide with the northern part of the World Heritage site (World Heritage Committee, 2014). In January 2014 the State Party submitted a re-nomination with significant boundary modifications which would exclude three areas from the property – the area of Chudnoe gold deposit, a quartz quarry and a granite sand extraction area, as well as a linear area in the south of YVNP around the existing SRTO-Torzhok gas pipeline – and would add three areas in the PL350 enclave and the Upper Illych basin. However, the re-nomination was not evaluated as it was considered incomplete by the World Heritage Centre (World Heritage Committee, 2014). Whilst the State Party confirmed that the boundary of YVNP has not been modified to allow for mining (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2022, 2024), the World Heritage Centre continues to receive reports on a proposed new draft law which would make it possible to change the boundaries of federally protected natural areas to accommodate economic activities such as mining (World Heritage Committee, 2021, 2023). As the legal protection status is an integral part of the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of the property, the removal of the legal protection from parts of the property would constitute a clear threat to the integrity of the property and the boundaries.

The World Heritage property overlaps with the Pechoro-Ilychsky Biosphere Reserve. No information were made available on the coordination between the Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage Property on the overlapping area.

The Virgin Komi World Heritage Site has now been subject to consistent and repeated decisions from the World Heritage Committee making recommendations and requests on a number of issues, the most concerning of which relates to the halting gold mining operations within the site and reversing boundary changes to Yugyd Va National Park, which excised the gold mining site and several other areas from the Park, but also including issues of tourism management and planning, and sustainable finance. Whilst the issues concerning the Committee have been addressed to some extent, key recommendations and decisions of the World Heritage Committee have still not been implemented or implemented partially (UNESCO, 2012, World Heritage Committee 2009; 2010, 2011; 2012; 2013; 2013; 2014; 2015; 2016; 2018, 2021, 2023).

The Park is carrying out works on the topic of “Climate change monitoring”, in the context of which research is being carried out on the dynamics of the forest boundary on the western slope of the Subpolar Urals, as well as monitoring the condition of glaciers (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024). In September 2024, an expedition to the Hoffman Glacier was carried out, together with the laboratory of dendrochronology of the Ural Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology. In addition, monitoring of areas where avalanche occurrences are recorded is carried out, with a database maintained and visualized as a layer on the interactive map of the Park. No more detailed information is available on the planned or current climate resilience activities in response to such monitoring.

The management system is informed by the 2017-2031 Integrated Management Plan (IMP) for the entire World Heritage site (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). The IMP centres around a number of targeted action plan programs including conservation and restoration of natural complexes, enforcement of environmental regulations, education, research and monitoring as well as the development of regulated tourism and recreation. Independent management plans also exist for the individual components of the site - Yugyd Va National Park and Pechoro-Ilychskiy Nature Reserve (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2019).

Enforcement of environmental laws within the site is well defined within the IMP, with a number of management tasks set out towards this end (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). However, the relative lack of integration between national and international designations concerning the conservation of the site as delineated in the World Heritage inscription, as opposed to the national level designations, represents a potential barrier to effective law enforcement. Furthermore the reported budget deficit in implementing the management tasks for law enforcement is likely to limit the success of law enforcement activities (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). Illegal exploitation of forest resources on the edge of the property, in the buffer zones of the two components, as well as small-scale poaching for hunting and fishing, likely still pose a certain risk. Despite this, the State Party reports effective patrolling and a reduced level of poaching in recent years within the site: 25 breaches of the law were recorded in 2024 (65 in 2022), 4 of which related to the illegal use of natural resources) (28 in 2022) (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2022, 2024).

At the time of initiating the Integrated Management Plan, the State Party reported a major budget deficit for the first financial year of its implementation. The budget was in deficit across all of the targeted action plan programs in ideal implementation scenarios and fell short on five out of seven even for baseline scenarios (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). For example, staffing levels currently stand at around half of what is required in order to achieve the management objectives set out in the IMP, for which there is a 25% budget deficit to fill in order to address the issue (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). As a result, the effectiveness of the management system may be severely compromised if not addressed urgently. As a result, the World Heritage Committee have requested the State Party to do so, however as yet no information has been provided as to whether sufficient financial and human resources have been made available to this end (World Heritage Committee, 2018, 2021, 2023). Overall, the mode of financing the protection and management of the property appears to be widely dependent on the annual decisions of the State Party and, more incidentally, on few resources from tourism activities; it does not seem based on a sustainable, long-term financing mechanism, in line with the management objectives as defined in the integrated management plan for the period 2017-2031.

The total number of staff members of the site currently stands at 131 people. A total of 128 are full-time employees of the federal Specially Protected Natural Territories and three are contracted to the regional Specially Protected Natural Territories. According to the standards, 600 full-time employees are required in order to fulfill the management objectives of the site across the range of on site and administrative activities required, of whom the park staff represent 329 employees. As such, the IMP states that 'for the successful implementation of the programs of Specially Protected Natural Territories it is necessary to double the number of employees, the deficit of their budget, in this case, is estimated at 25% by administrations' (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). As such, staff capacity can be deemed as of some concern. Development and training of existing staff is also not addressed within the targeted action plans outlined in the IMP. In the absence of more recent detailed data, it is not possible to conclude whether current human resources are adequate to meet needs, in terms of numbers, training and level of expertise. It is very likely that these resources have not evolved over the last 4 years in proportions that would correspond to the international standards.

Both Yugyd Va National Park and Pechoro-Ilychinsky Strict Nature Reserve have educational programmes, which include museums/visitor centres, work with media, schools and teachers, production of booklets, videos and exhibitions, and implementation of special campaigns (MoNRE of RF, 2012b, c). In 2023, the Yugyd Va national park administration produced the film “Queen of the Ural Alps”, winning the grand prize of the X all Russian festival competition of tourism video “Wonders of Russia”. These activities are built upon within the IMP, which outlines education and interpretation as one of its key objectives (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017) and states that currently, educational activity of the site reaches around 35-58 thousand people a year in the Park, and 700-1200 people a year in the Reserve, including through in museums and visitor centers as well as educational institutions and clubs (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017).

There is clearly a potential to further develop ecological tourism in the site, based on its outstanding wilderness values. Currently, the National Park contains 57 residential buildings to accommodate tourists in its territory; 78 camping places and serves 17 (walking and water) routes, of which 4 remain open in winter (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). The large size and relative wilderness of the site are mostly sufficient to ensure that tourism has an insignificant local impact and does not exceed the capacity of the site. The impact of tourism on tundra ecosystems in the Man-Pupuner Plateau area is monitored on a regular basis, every two years. However, increasing demand for weekend tourism from nearby Vuktyl and Inta cities may be a growing challenge for management (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). Additionally, some concerns have arisen regarding impacts of visitation on the most popular trails, particularly those to the Man-Pupu-Ner plateau, some of which had to be closed to allow for ecological restoration (World Heritage Committee, 2018, 2021, 2023). The State Party has undertaken a series of activities, aiming at improving tourism facilities and minimizing tourism impacts on the property (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2022, 2024). A temporary helipad was constructed that allow to bring tourist groups on this plateau and to reduce the load on the trail (in the 2022 summer season, 547 people in 46 groups visited the Manpupuner plateau in this way). A new tourism federal legislation in the protected areas has been adopted in 2023; although this new regulation is not yet fully implemented in all areas, especially in those of regional importance, placed under the regional authorities, this legislation should lead to improve the tourism management in the property, in the future. A ten-year recreational action plan will be adopted in 2025, for the YVNP and then a draft sustainable tourism management strategy will be prepared (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024).

Natural resource use in Strict Nature Reserves of the Russian Federation is largely prohibited, however, Yugyd Va National Park includes a traditional use zone which is used by local indigenous people for reindeer herding (Debonnet et al., 2010). The IMP states that this activity is monitored in relation to the values of the site and so can be considered as having low impact (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). However, there is emerging concern regarding the sustainability of tourism activities within the site, particularly in accessing the Man-Pupu-Ner Plateau. These concerns have been expressed by the Committee (World Heritage Committee, 2018, 2021, 2023). While efforts have been made by the State Party to enforce visitor management in the Pechoro-Ilychskiy Nature Reserve component of the property, a sustainable tourism management planned has not been developed yet (World Heritage Committee, 2023; State Party of the Russian Federation, 2022, 2024). The State Party declared that works are underway to develop a Recreational Activities Plan for the Yugyd Va National Park for 10 years, its approval period planned in 2025.

The IMP includes provisions for biodiversity monitoring as well as identifying areas of potential anthropogenic impact on fauna and flora, such as poaching and sources of pollution, and planned measures to reduce their threats (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). However the level to which the monitoring activities are systematised and coordinated across the components of the site is uncertain. The site has a legacy of ecological research with The “Chronicles of Nature” of Pechoro-Ilychsky Strict Nature Reserve having been kept since 1936, including a monitoring of key observations of natural values (MoNRE of RF, 2012d) and the IMP contains baseline data of the biodiversity of the site (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). The management of the property regularly monitors both the state of conservation and trends in the evolution of species and natural habitats; it also monitors human pressures (e.g. tourism), fires and meteorological and climatic changes (e.g. rainfall and snow conditions) (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2019). According to the most recent information available (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024), the conservation status of the animal populations and plant communities present in the property appears to be stable; no significant damage to forest ecosystems has been observed in recent years and tourist pressure is fully compatible with the property's carrying capacity. However, no reliable data on trends in key wildlife species and tourism activity have been made available through accessible comprehensive monitoring programmes. Given the information available and the lack of more precise data, it is not possible to assess the effectiveness and quality of this monitoring. As such, it is possible that the monitoring programmes throughout the site would benefit from greater systematization.

Research is carried out in both component areas of the site through strategic partnerships and cooperation with institutes such as the Komi Scientific Center of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who provide technical and scientific expertise in the values for which the site is inscribed (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation, 2017). These partnerships are intended to inform the management of the site through the preparation and publication of findings and the subsequent development of recommendations. The IMP sets out a costed action plan for the relevant and necessary research activities, however it is uncertain to what extent the budget deficit reported by the State Party will impact the implementation of these objectives, given their associated costs. There may also be room for improvement regarding the integration of scientific research at the site with the international scientific community. According to the State Party, the research effort is currently focused on the study and conservation of the reindeer as well as the study and preservation of the historical and cultural heritage (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024), however no further information has been made available. It is therefore not possible to assess in greater depth the extent and quality of the research being carried out in the property.

The main potential threats to the Property currently arise from outside its boundaries; they are mainly based on the exploration and exploitation of mineral resources that could be authorised in the future on the periphery of the property, and on the potentially excessive exploitation of forestry resources. In the past, the State has expressed its intention to create an eastern buffer zone and to upgrade the protection status of the PL 350 forest plot which would secure the site's integrity over the long-term. While no recent information was provided by the State Party on the state of progress of these measures, both measures would ensure a higher mitigation of the threats outside the current boundaries and secure the site’s integrity over the long term.

Through the Integrated Management Plan (IMP), the management system is generally well designed to conserve the site, including combatting the existing threats to it's Outstanding Universal Value. However, the State Party have reported a significant budget deficit to implementing a number of the targeted action plan programs and thus the capacity of the staff to effectively implement the IMP is likely to be significantly curtailed (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2019). The World Heritage Committee requested the State Party to increase the financial and human resources dedicated to the management of the property (World Heritage Committee, 2023). Since then, no detailed information or data has been provided by the State Party on the level of resources allocated to this management and the State Party's updated report on the state of conservation of the property for the year 2024 (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024) provides only very general information on the resources allocated to it, which is clearly insufficient to conclude on the level and quality of this management. A coherent sustainable tourism management strategy is needed to limit the impacts from visitation. It is therefore crucial that the planned ten-year recreational action plan for the YVNP, which should be adopted in 2025 (State Party of the Russian Federation, 2024), and a sustainable tourism management strategy are to be developed as soon as possible. As such, currently some concern exists surrounding the effectiveness of the management system.