Interview with Vladimir Vasilyev, wildlife protection department chief of the Primorye Territory.

Mr Vasilyev, on 7 November President Vladimir Putin signed a number of instructions. Some of the priority ones concern the protection of Amur tigers and Far Eastern leopards. What are you doing in this context in the Primorye Territory?

The president paid a great deal of attention to the count of Amur tigers in 2014-2015. This is a very serious effort that involves many people and large sums of money. This is very meticulous work. It’s done once a decade.

The purpose of this comprehensive count is to determine how many Amur tigers live in their natural habitat – the Primorye Territory, the Khabarovsk Territory, the Amur Region and the Jewish Autonomous Region. We’ll also establish the distribution of tigers in this habitat, as well as the sex and age composition of the population. All this information will help us better understand exactly what we have in Russia in terms of these rare wild cats.

What does an extensive count of Amur tigers require?

We first need to plan it out and determine what resources and experts we need and how much it will cost. We need to plan all the measures step-by-step to gather accurate information about the animal.

<…>

How many Amur tigers and Far Eastern leopards live in the Primorye Territory according to recent counts?

According to this year’s data, there are 50 Far Eastern leopards. As for Amur tigers, there are about 500 in their natural habitat. This figure is confirmed by information from 16 monitoring sites.

Our observations show that the population is stable. We’ll get more precise figures from the count in 2014–2015.

Mr Vasilyev, what amendments were made to the Law on Hunting? What aspects of game management will they affect?

Amendments to the Law on Hunting were made not only this year but also in the past year. Their aim is to make provisions of the law more specific.

This year a provision on hunting control was introduced. Strictly speaking, it existed before but wasn’t enforced. In his instruction the president ordered that it be made operational so that game farm managers could work on this.

The departments responsible for writing regulations must devise provisions allowing game farm managers to exercise hunting control. They should also prescribe new regulations for the work of government bodies, in particular, procedures for certifying game wardens, as well as for service certificates and badges. These regulations should be drafted early next year.

How will public inspectors operate?

Game wardens of hunting areas will be charged with this job. They will be responsible for wildlife protection and control and will have some procedural powers, such as the right to check documents of hunters, perform inspection procedures and confiscate contraband.

Who is doing this now?

This work is carried out by our department, which is authorised to do this job, and its subordinate government body.

This is a fairly heavy burden. How does your department cope with it?

Indeed, this is a very heavy burden because hunting areas in the taiga are enormous and it is difficult to monitor them. In his previous instruction the president said that at least three game wardens should be in charge of one municipal area.

This is a positive change in our work, but we still don’t have enough inspectors. For example, there are five game wardens for the entire Terneisky District. This is a very low number. This is why we streamlined our department at the end of the past year. We incorporated four operational units, each of which has two mobile groups. We intend to involve game farms, which did not have such powers before.

Mr Vasilyev, what are you doing to fight poaching?

Our mobile units bear the brunt of the burden. They monitor hunting from the southernmost to the northernmost point of the Primorye territory.

We also have specialists in municipal entities. They supervise game farms. We are working hard to combat poaching and are a leading region in this respect. However, the incidence of poaching remains high, as it was last year. This year, we have detained more than 1,100 people for various infractions, registered 1,500 violations, fined poachers for over half a million roubles and confiscated over 100 rifles.

Once game wardens assume their new duties, these figures will grow even higher. 

What are the most frequent violations?

There are all different kinds. First, people hunt in areas where hunting is prohibited or out of season, or they hunt for forbidden animals. Some do not have licenses while others use prohibited hunting methods. For instance, though the use of vehicles during hunting is strictly prohibited, hunters often use snowmobiles. Some use boats with engines while hunting for waterfowl, which is also prohibited.