Institutions and forest tenure in the Russian forest policy

Forestry and the forest sector as a whole mirrors the political, economic and social changes that take place in a society. In Russia, the change of formal legal institutions in the forest sector has been fast since the beginning of 1990s. Since then, the Russian forest sector has been integrated more closely to the international market. The recognition of forests' role as the main renewable natural resource has fuelled increasing political and administrative effort on the development of the sector. This study attempts to shed light on the reasons why the Russian forest policy has failed to effectively improve forest sector development. The arrangement of property rights to forest resources, and the institutional arrangement of forest tenure form the core of analysis. For this purpose, the framework of institutional analysis (IAD) is adapted to the organisation of forest tenure in Russia. In analysis a particular attention is paid to the content and enforcement of the Forest Code of 2007. Institutions are the rules of game in a society and by structuring incentives they facilitate and constrain the economic sustainability of forestry. Formal rules can be created rapidly, whereas informal norms constrain the enforcement of formal rules. Property rights are key institutions facilitating the actions of economic actors. Property rights are referred to as a bundle of rights in relation to a certain property. The models of path-dependency and transaction costs are used to analyse and explain the institutional change. The materials used in this study consist of legislation, academic and professional papers, statistics collected from public sources as well as primary data collected. Despite federal polity, the decision-making is highly centralised in Russia. The joint governance of forest resources between the federal and regional governments has been one of the focal issues of the forest policy in post-Soviet Russia. Results reveal that the there are constant struggles to achieve economic sustainability in forestry. Obscure property rights to forests have worked against economically, socially and ecologically sustainable forestry. The effect of formal institutional changes on the everyday forestry operations has remained low. This is partly due to the strong informal institutions and weak enforcement of formal rules. Historical courses of developments, like regional over cuttings, centralised forest administration, the separation of forestry and forest industries and the lack of market information are currently affecting available forest policy options in relation to management and use of forest resources. The lack of transparent …