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https://english.elpais.com/international/2024-03-29/philanthropist-group-buys-up-large-tracts-of-land-in-romania-to-create-european-yellowstone.html>
"“It has to be an ambitious conservation project,” Hansjörg Wyss, one of the
world’s leading environmental philanthropists, told Christoph and Barbara
Promberger, promoters of the Foundation Conservation Carpathia, as a condition
for financing the purchase of land in Romania, a country that today contains
65% of Europe’s virgin forests. The aim is to create “the European
Yellowstone,” as the largest donor of the initiative described it after flying
over the enormous expanse of the Fagaras Mountains, located in the extreme
south of the Carpathian range, in a helicopter. So far, the foundation has
already bought up 27,027 hectares in this still wild region, but the goal is to
create a gigantic protected area of 200,000 hectares, an area roughly
equivalent to the North Cascades National Park in Washington.
This area of Transylvania is home to one of the most important wildlife
ecosystems in Europe. Wolves and brown bears — of the latter there are more
than 5,000 in the country — lynx and beavers roam freely on the forested slopes
of the Fagaras Mountains, the highest in the southern Carpathians. Several
years ago, 80 bison were reintroduced two centuries after their disappearance
from these territories, through a program run by the Foundation Conservation
Carpathia. It all started in the mid-2000s when the Prombergers noticed the
illegal logging that was still taking place in the Romanian forests, spurred by
the restitution of woodlands to former owners from the pre-communist era.
Illegal deforestation even spilled over into state-protected parks, such as
Piatra Craiului — meaning The King’s Rock — one of the most popular in the
country due to its immense variety of flora and fauna.
“‘Only if someone buys these forests and places them in private hands can we
save them, at least until the state realizes the importance of preserving
them,’ the director of a national park jokingly let slip,” says Barbara
Promberger. At that point, the Austrian biologist and her husband Cristoph, a
German forester, set out to find philanthropists and conservationists to raise
funds to buy large tracts of forest to halt deforestation and, at the same
time, promote ecotourism in support of local communities. “This national park
has to serve to protect nature, but also to economically develop the areas
involved,” says Barbara, who has lived in a tiny village in Brasov province for
30 years. As a conservation model, they were inspired by the Tompkins project
launched in the 1990s to restore habitats in southern Chile and Argentina, and
also by the Bavarian Forest National Park."
Via Esther Schindler.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
