Two Romanian forests could join UNESCO’s natural world patrimony

The National Forests Administrator Romsilva started last year the procedures to have two forests in the range of the Cozia National Park, in central Romania, included in the UNESCO Natural World Patrimony list. The two forests cover a combined 3,389 hectares. The Cozia forest has a 2,286 hectares surface, while the Lotrisor forest, 1,103 hectares. Both are secular, virgin or quasi-virgin forests of beech and a mix of beech and hardwood. The forests, which have evolved without human intervention, include trees that are over 50 meters tall and have a diameter of 2 meters. The forests are already included in the complete protection area of the Cozia National Park, which covers almost 8,500 hectares. Any human intervention is strictly forbidden here. Romsilva started the procedures for the UNESCO natural patrimony inclusion last year and a UNESCO team and one from the International Union for Nature Conservation (IUCN) already evaluated them. The inclusion process is currently underway. Last year, Romsilva included almost 10,000 hectares of forests in the National Catalogue of Virgin and Quasi-virgin Forests. Romsilva manages over 3.14 million hectares of state-owned forests, including 22 national or nature parks. The protection of Romania’s virgin forests has been supported by Prince Charles, who was featured in the Wild Carpathia film series, which looked at the country’s nature heritage. Romania’s forest management company invests EUR 9.3 mln in regeneration works Illegal logging in Romanian state-owned forests drops in Q1 editor@romania-insider.com