Russia is the largest wood country. The total area of the wood fund and other wood resources of the Russian Federation exceeds 1180 million hectares. Russian resources of standing wood are estimated in 81,9 billion cubic metres (1998).
Coniferous woods rate among all Russian woods is more than ¾. Russia possesses about 1/5 of all global wood resources i.e. the largest stock of wood in the world. Boreal woods and woods of the temperate zone are almost exclusive property of Russia (2/3 of the global stock).
Percentage of wood territories to the whole territory of Russia (including all its water basins) is 45,3%.
The woods of Russia supervised by forestry authorities, are represented by three types of basic species, as a whole they occupy 645,9 million hectares, or 89,9% of all wood resources. Among them coniferous trees (pine, cedar, fur-tree, silver fir, larch) occupy 508,7 million hectares (70,8%); small-leaved species (birch, aspen, linden, poplar, willow, alder) - 119,7 million hectares (16,7%); large-leaved (oak, beech, ash, maple, elm, hornbeam, locust, saxaul) - 17,5 million hectares (2,4%).
Other tree species and bushes occupy 72,8 million hectares or 10,1% of woodlands, this group is mainly represented by shrubs of pre-tundra belt. Almost all plants of this group (72,2 million hectares or 99,3%) grow in the Asian part of the country.
Source: http://russia.rin.ru |
