Podcast in English
Text size
Bulgarian National Radio © 2024 All Rights Reserved

Self-afforestation – natural way to replenish Bulgarian forests

Photo: Pixabay

2-3 millennia ago over 80% of Bulgaria’s territory was covered by forests. Over the years, this vast forest was gradually logged and turned into agricultural land and pastures. Thus, at the beginning of the 20th century, only 15% to 20% of this country’s territory was covered by forests. Thanks to voluntary work, the efforts of foresters and annual afforestation, forests are gradually being restored.


Nowadays, and especially in the last 30 years, millions of hectares of abandoned agricultural lands have turned into forest areas. This is about one tenth of the total forest area. However, it is threatened by deforestation, because landowners have the opportunities to receive EU subsidies.


"More and more landowners and tenants of municipal agricultural land think that this is a big chance to earn easy money," forest policy expert Alexander Dunchev told BNR. "They just clear self-afforested pastures and fields and get some quick money, which, however, leads to the destruction of these self-afforested areas in an unaccountable and illegal manner."

Lands are often abandoned because they are not suitable for cultivation. Self-afforestated areas are logged, but they are not used as pastures or for planting crops later ... According to the current Forestry Act, these lands become forest areas if their owners give a permission for these areas to be placed into another land category. If owners want to use them as agricultural land, they are given three years to clean and prepare them for this purpose. If they fail to do so, their status changes automatically. In practice, it turns out that the state encourages the logging of these self-afforested forests. Sometimes owners clean illegally their land the way they want without notifying the responsible institutions. The state needs to find a balance between the interest of the owner and the public interest,in order to stop this logging.


The expert assessment on which agricultural territory must be preserved as such and which should become a forest is also very important:

"Currently, the wounds of nature are being healed by self-afforestations of abandoned agricultural land. The question is what to do with these forests which cover a large territory. Should we log them to receive subsidies for bare pastures, quite often on eroded terrains, or look for financial incentives for their protection. By increasing the forest cover we fulfill the global targets aimed at preserving water resources and mitigating climate changes."


English version: Kostadin Atanasov

Photos: Pixabay, library, Ani Petrova



Последвайте ни и в Google News Showcase, за да научите най-важното от деня!
Listen to the daily news from Bulgaria presented in "Bulgaria Today" podcast, available in Spotify.

More from category

The forum at the National Museum of Archeology

The Untold Stories of Bulgarians programme gathers the legacy of our compatriots as ancestral memory

A short video kaleidoscope of the "untold stories" of worthy Bulgarians - scientists, entrepreneurs, engineers, artists - who have contributed to our country's good image in the eyes of the world opened an unconventional public forum that showcased the..

published on 11/14/24 12:48 PM

The film "Gundi: Legend of Love" has also thrilled the Bulgarians in USA

The film "Gundi: Legend of Love" caused a sensation across the Ocean. Screenings of the film story about the life of legendary football player Georgi Asparuhov – Gundi were held in Los Angeles and Las Vegas as the halls were full...

published on 11/14/24 11:12 AM

Monuments to the totalitarian past stand, but few memorials honour the victims

On this day 35 years ago, the authoritarian regime of communist dictator Todor Zhivkov collapsed. To mark the anniversary, the BGNES news agency carried out a survey of monuments to totalitarianism. The agency checked whether the monuments of the..

published on 11/10/24 7:45 AM