One of the sessions of the Second Eastern Economic Forum, which was held on the campus of Russia’s Far Eastern Federal University on Russky Island on 2-3 September, was titled Preserving Biodiversity and Maintaining Ecological Balance in the Asia-Pacific Region. Konstantin Chuichenko, chairman of the Supervisory Council of the Amur Tiger Centre, spoke about possible investments in projects to protect and preserve rare animals and fight poachers.

According to experts, poachers used to kill up to a hundred tigers in Russia every year. “By tightening legislation and the efforts of law-enforcement and nature conservation agencies against poachers, the annual damage has been reduced to 20 or 30 tigers,” Chuichenko said.

The Amur Tiger Centre will use sponsors’ funds to create ranger stations in the tiger’s distribution area. “We believe that it would be wise to use the Soviet experience of special stations, which were set up in the forest to ease access for law-enforcement agencies and research groups,” Chuichenko said in his report.

The session participants also discussed the operation of Bikin National Park, which was established in the Primorye Territory on 3 November 2015 to preserve the main habitat areas of the Amur tiger and to encourage the indigenous peoples living in the area to protect endangered animals.

Other participants in the discussion were Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Sergei Donskoi, Chair of the Far Eastern Leopards Supervisory Board Sergei Ivanov, and Russian and foreign climate change experts.