During 19 years about 2 thousand hectares forest were
cut. Within the framework of the project conduced by “State Forest Monitoring
Center” SNCO (State Non-Commercial Organization) office with the support of GTZ
in Armenia that forested area in Armenia is 332.333 hectares.

Last timesuch a study was carried outin 1993 when the
area of forests was 334.100 hectares. And though after that different
organizations published different figures none of them can be considered as
factual as such a serious study hasn’t been ever done” ensures the Chief
Forester of “Hayantar” (Armforest) SNCO Ruben Petrosyan. To mention, these
figures do not include bushes, parks and other afforested areas which do not
correspond to the standards of forest.

The President of Union of Greens Hakob Sanasaryan
claims that the published figures do not correspond to the reality.

“Let them say that the organizations gave them those
figures. There is no NGO in Armenia which has exact figures on deforestation.
Minimum 600-700 thousand cubic meters of forest arecut annually. Hundreds of
hectares are cut as a result of mining and they are not considered illegal”
says Sanasaryan.

Inga Zarafyan the President of “Ekolur” informative
NGO reminded about the researches of ENPY FLEG International Center according
to which in 2011 the annual demand for firewood was 450 thousand cubic meters
in Armenia.

“For me the figures of ENPY FLEG organization are more
trustworthy especially when they mention that the volume of illegal logging is
80 times higher from the official figures. Besides I’m sure this year those
figures will be more as there were more loggings in rural residences as a
result of such cold winter” thinks Zarafyan.

Ruben Petrosyan also mentioned that this year the
number of forest fires has decreased but the situation is still concerning.
During 12 years in 1998-2010 2460 hectares area were burnt and during the last
two years in 2010-2011 810 hectares. The figures of the following 10 years may
be higher. State Forest Monitoring Center and different interested
non-governmental organizations found out that in 2011 3216 trees were cut
illegally which is less as compared to previous years.