When the forest takes back its rights
Audio 19:30
Bialowieza Forest, Poland.
© Kacper Pempel / REUTERS
By: Frédérique Lebel
22 mins
Walk in the forest today in Accents d'Europe.
A forest which is being reborn and even rewilding, tell us our two guests today, Gilbert Cochet and Béatrice Kremer Cochet.
(Replay)
Publicity
They publish in Actes Sud "
Europe re-savaged, towards a new world
", a formidable optimistic manifesto in these times when we tend to cultivate ecological pessimism.
First of all, it should be remembered that 10,000 years ago, Europe was 80% covered with virgin forest ...
But all is not lost, because of the difficulty in accessing certain areas, our two naturalists estimate that 30 million hectares by 2030 will return to the forest.
There are few primary forests left in Europe, that is, forests that have not been exploited by man. The great example is the forest of Bialowieza straddling Poland and Belarus.
A forest which dates back thousands of years, which also shelters herds of bison, and which is protected by Unesco and the European Union. But, the Polish conservative government authorized cuts much criticized by environmentalists, in a forest where the memory of the deforestation of 2016 remains strong.
This is the report from our correspondent Sarah Bakaloglou.
Should man's access be prohibited or, in any case, terribly limited his intrusion into certain forests
which remain wild, this is the bet that the authorities of
Bosnia and Herzegovina have
made in the Balkans
for the
Perućica
forest
, in the southwest of the country.
Simon Rico.
For Gilbert Cochet, Béatrice Kremer Cochet, a forest which takes back its rights, it is a forest which once again shelters wild species, bears, wolves, bison… This time, an active human policy is needed. .
We are going to project ourselves a little further into the future, with this vast project by botanist Francis Hallée, that of recreating a primary forest in the heart of Europe.
A project also dear to our two guests.
Program originally aired on April 12, 2021.
Newsletter
Receive all international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Poland
Belarus
Environment
Bosnia and herzegovina
On the same subject
The area of virgin tropical forest destroyed in 2020 equivalent to the Netherlands
Great report
In Poland, the forest comes into resistance
International report
The virgin forest of Bialowieza, classified as a Unesco heritage, is in danger