Environmentalists are sounding the alarm: the government is abandoning forest protection. Deputy Minister Dorożała denies the allegations.

• The area of forests protected under the so-called moratorium, a decision by the Ministry of Climate, is to be reduced by as much as a quarter, Deputy Minister Mikołaj Dorożała announced on Thursday, July 24. This applies to portions of Poland's most valuable forests, where logging was halted or limited in January 2024.
• "Instead of moving forward with its election promises, the government is taking a major step backward," says Marek Józefiak of Greenpeace Poland. "We expect the Ministry of Culture and Environment not to capitulate, but to take decisive steps to introduce 20% exclusions of the most valuable forests for the good and safety of all of us," comments Radosław Ślusarczyk of the Workshop for All Beings.
• Mikołaj Dorożała, in an interview with Portal Samorządowy, explains that this was a temporary measure that needed to be verified after the conclusions of the National Conference on Forests. He assures that there is no question of taking a step back, and the government is not backing down from its promise to protect 20 percent of forests.

In January 2024, as part of the so-called forest moratorium , 1.3% of forest areas managed by the State Forests were excluded from logging. On January 8, 2024, the State Forests received an order from the Ministry of Climate and Environment to suspend or limit such work. The list included the most valuable fragments of the Świętokrzyska Forest, Augustów Forest, Knyszyńska Forest, the relict Carpathian Forest, and the spa forests near Iwonicz-Zdrój .

According to a January 2024 Ipsos public opinion poll , 84.6% of citizens demanded that 20% of Poland's most valuable forests be exempt from logging . This was also one of the coalition commitments, as stipulated in the current government's agreement.

Now, environmental organizations— Greenpeace and the Workshop for All Beings —are sounding the alarm: the Ministry of Climate and Environment is reducing the moratorium area by a quarter. They fear the government is reneging on its election promises.

This concerns the announcement of a reduction of the area covered by the moratorium by one quarter, which was made on July 24 this year at the Parliamentary Committee on Environmental Protection, Natural Resources and Forestry by Mikołaj Dorożała, General Conservator of Nature and Deputy Minister of Climate and Environment.

The introduction of the moratorium was a response to the biodiversity crisis. The conservation status of Natura 2000 forest habitats is over 50 percent poor, and Poland is obligated to improve it. Therefore, it is very concerning that the Ministry of the Environment is reducing the moratorium. Minister, what about Moratorium 2.0? When will the promised 20 percent of forests be free of sawmills? If there is plenty of wood, but nature is in poor condition, when will we start protecting it?

- Radosław Ślusarczyk, member of the State Council for Nature Conservation and president of the Workshop for All Beings Association, asked Minister Dorożała during the parliamentary committee.

Naturalists explain that this is not only a matter of protecting valuable wildlife, but also of our own safety. Deforestation, for example, can dramatically increase the risk of flooding.

The State Forests are logging without approved Forest Management Plans. They are ignoring social agreements and the need for profound changes in forest management in times of climate crisis – increasingly frequent droughts and floods. Therefore, we expect the Ministry of Climate and Environment not to capitulate, but to take decisive steps to implement 20% of the most valuable forests for the benefit and safety of all.

- now adds Radosław Ślusarczyk.

Marek Józefiak, spokesman and expert on environmental policy at Greenpeace Polska, speaks in an equally critical tone about the announcement of the reduction of areas covered by the moratorium.

This move highlights the fundamental problem of Donald Tusk's government: a lack of consistency and effectiveness in delivering on its promises. To date, truly protected areas have covered only a small fraction of the most valuable forests, and the government is taking a significant step backward instead of forward. Meanwhile, the Bieszczady Mountains and planned national parks are still awaiting real protection from sawflies. In the Bieszczady Mountains, foresters are commissioning logging operations without up-to-date Forest Management Plans. In the next decade, they plan to cut 92 percent of the Stuposiany and Lutowiska forest districts.

In his opinion, "the government seems to have forgotten that promises to improve the protection of Polish forests were among the key demands with which the coalition parties went to the elections and enjoy the support of the vast majority of Poles."

The moratorium on logging has been opposed from the outset by the forestry, timber, furniture, and paper industries. In January of this year, representatives of these industries estimated that excluding 20% of forests from sustainable forest management would result in the loss of 70,000 jobs and a PLN 4.5 billion loss to the budget from corporate income tax, personal income tax, and social security contributions.

In April of this year, Mikołaj Dorożała reported that the moratorium – "the largest action aimed at increasing forest protection in Poland since the designation of Natura 2000 sites" – had no negative impact on the timber industry or the State Forests' results. The decline in timber harvesting following the moratorium was only 154,000 cubic meters, which is within the margin of statistical error and has no impact on the domestic market. The timber industry achieved 1.1 percent growth last year, the pulp and paper industry 6.3 percent, and the woodworking industry 3.8 percent.

Now , in an interview with the Local Government Portal, he says:

The moratorium was not a permanent form of protection, only a temporary safeguard for the most valuable forests.

And he explains that when they were announced - in January 2024 - the State Forests lacked available, integrated data showing which specific forests were the most valuable in Poland.

For a year, we led the National Conference on Forests, which brought together foresters, NGOs, environmentalists, and the timber industry. We developed criteria for forest protection. This document is nearly 90 pages long and represents a form of compromise. It includes criteria for defining forests of natural value, socially important forests, and so-called old-growth forests. The goal was to find a formula acceptable to all parties. Today, when it comes to forest protection, there is strong polarization, and finding a middle ground is extremely difficult. We attempted to break this stalemate through the National Conference on Forests, based on science and reliable data.

Mikołaj Dorożała adds that work on the criteria continued until the end of last year. Since January of this year, geomatics experts have been superimposing data on forest maps, including those covering the moratorium areas. This valuation shows that moratorium forests that fully meet the criteria represent 74% of the moratorium area.

"The moratorium included a so-called red zone and a blue zone. The red zone, which completely excluded timber harvesting, encompassed the most valuable stands. In this zone, the condition of the areas after verification remains essentially unchanged, while the 26% excluded from the moratorium are primarily areas of less valuable natural value that were not excluded from logging, and only forest management modifications were implemented," explains Dorożała.

When asked about the implementation of the promise from the coalition agreement to exclude 20 percent of forests from logging, the minister replies:

This is a different issue. I understand the environmentalists and NGOs, as they continue to fight, support this process, and are right in principle. However, this cannot be mistaken. The moratorium was a temporary decision because we saw disturbing plans for very intensive timber harvesting in forests that had very high environmental value. Today, this is confirmed, as 74% of this area is being retained as part of the systemic legislative solutions we are working on. Old-growth forests will also be added, meaning an additional 1% next year and 1% the year after that—approximately 200,000 hectares.

In his opinion, reaching 20 percent of forests covered by logging restrictions is a process that is still included in the coalition agreement.

And we are implementing it. We have a plan to achieve this, and the government is not reneging on this promise. We simply need to follow the criteria we have jointly developed and spread this process out over time. These arrangements also lead to an adjustment to the moratorium area.

- says Mikołaj Dorożała.