On 5 April 2015, Land of the Leopard National Park celebrated its third birthday. Tatyana Baranovskaya, the park’s director, looks back at what has been accomplished and unveils plans for the future.

Question: How do you assess the progress made over the past three years?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: Our institution is still in its infancy. At present, it can be compared with a three-year-old child.  What do you expect a three-year-old child to be able to do? To walk, talk, and take care of itself. That’s what we are like now. First of all, it is necessary to point out our strong sides. Our structural units effectively cooperate with each other. We have wonderful land, very good staff, and we strive to make our work smooth and automatic.

Among the pluses I would also single out fruitful cooperation between Land of the Leopard and the authorities at all levels – municipal, district, regional, and at the very top. So, we have every reason to be optimistic about our future, all the more so that the Far Eastern leopard population is growing.

Although much work lies ahead, what’s important is that we have everything we need to keep moving forward. Even if something gets in the way, it can be overcome. Problems do exist, but the absence of problems means that there is no development. We should be careful not to create problems by ourselves. We have the whole world before us. We are looking at this world with the wide-eyed admiration of a three-year-old child, and we have every chance to become the world’s best national park.

Question: What do you think are the main problems that the park is facing now?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: Contacts with local residents pose the biggest problem today. The locals complain about being prohibited on the specially protected territory, despite the fact that every resident of the towns or villages adjoining Land of the Leopard is entitled to a free pass to the park – that was announced almost a year ago.

In 2014, more than 2,000 passes were issued. This year, we have already issued 250. In order to solve this problem, they simply need to speak with our office in the town of Barabsh.

We are open for a constructive dialogue. It should be remembered, however, that no one will benefit from a consumer-like attitude to nature. Unfortunately, up to now many people have no idea what a national park is and how to treat it, so that it doesn’t affect their own lives. I very much hope that the locals come to understand that the national park is good for them.

Not long ago, we held a number of interesting meetings with local businessmen, and we have reason to hope that some of them realised that the proximity of their homes to Land of the Leopard is a wonderful opportunity for them to make money, but not through poaching. We need help in developing tourism in the neighbouring Khasan District – a chance to see the world’s rarest felines opens up these horizons, and not just for our national park.

Question: You mentioned poaching as a negative impact on Land of the Leopard of neighbouring populated areas. Where do things stand now?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: Poaching remains our second biggest problem after forest fires. But before we continue, let’s recall what that area was like a couple of years ago – a far cry from the current situation. Poaching has sharply decreased, but has grown more sophisticated, more elaborate.

Before, poachers walked into the forest and hunted there, now, more often, they do it from the road. They are harder to catch as they know all the vehicles that belong to the national park. In some cases, inspectors had to use their personal vehicles to track them down.

Poachers today are more familiar with the law and are better prepared technically. For example, some of them use special radio devices to listen in on conversations between inspectors. Naturally, in order to fight all that, our employees need to improve their skills and be better equipped. We work hard to help them. There will be a regular seminar for inspectors one of these days. It will focus on extinguishing forest fires and improving the legal literacy of the inspectors.

Question: You mentioned forest fires. They pose a big threat to a national park. How serious is that problem now?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: This spring, unlike last year, the weather was working for us – we had snow and the wind was blowing to the north. But a new trouble emerged. The spring hunting season kicked off and hundreds of drunken hunters began making fires. So, inspectors have to patrol the adjoining areas to protect the park.

At the same time, as I already said, we are helping our inspectors to hone their fire-fighting skills. This year, our employees took part in regional forest fire response exercises, and next week they will have an additional training session conducted by specially invited fire-fighting instructors. They will practice teamwork and specific fire-fighting methods, and will learn to handle additional protective tools.

In addition, this year we will receive more fire-fighting equipment and protective gear. Work is under way to clean up mineralised areas along the outer borders and inside Land of the Leopard.

Question: What does Land of the Leopard plan to do during its fourth year as far as tourism is concerned?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: Tourism is everything to us, a promising future for us and business opportunities for the locals. For businessmen of the Khasan District, it means new jobs, for others – it’s a chance to revive local folk crafts, to create something new, to pursue their creativity. We will be glad to hear suggestions from local people who want to make souvenirs or are interested in other forms of cooperation.

One of our tasks is to develop new tourist trails in partnership with local residents. A new ecological path will run near the town of Siniy Utyos, and another one may appear in the valley of the River Gryaznaya. And we intend to visit a local businessman who is willing to cooperate with the national park.

We want to have versatile tourist trails in Land of the Leopard. For example, we are considering an equestrian path. And perhaps we will organise trails to the caves, one of which – a very large one – was discovered recently by speleologists. Maybe we will even have bike trails some day. But that will require well-developed infrastructure that would minimise the impact on nature.

We are studying which areas could be interesting for tourists and where tourist flows would not disturb our felines in any way. That’s the primary goal – two in one: nice for tourists and no burden on the felines. We are open to proposals and willing to take into account the wishes of the locals.

Question: What else is there in store for Land of the Leopard National Park in time for its fourth anniversary – 5 April 2016?

Tatyana Baranovskaya: Above all, the ecological path near Land of the Leopard’s visit-centre will be fully upgraded and open for tourists within a year. The current Leopard Path trail will be brushed up. Also, we hope to map out new tourist trails by next April and will start to equip them with the necessary infrastructure.

And we will keep working on the things that I mentioned before. We will enhance protection against poachers as well as fire prevention through improving the skills and equipment of our employees, and we hope to establish effective cooperation with the locals. I will say it again – we have every reason to be optimistic about the future. And if people show a little more understanding for our tasks, we have every chance of success.