Volcanoes of Kamchatka

• Illegal activities (illegal salmon fishing)
• Mining (gold mining)
• Major linear utilities (gas pipeline)
• Renewable energy facilities (development of a geothermal power station)
• Fires
• Management and institutional factors (boundary changes)
• Governance (lack of management structure and coordination system)
• Ground transport infrastructure (construction of the Esso-Palana road)
• Legal framework (need for the development of a comprehensive national legal framework for the protection and management of natural properties)
• Decline in populations of wild reindeer and snow sheep
• Major visitor accommodation and associated infrastructure (impacts of proposed tourism infrastructure development - ‘Three Volcanoes Park’)

N/A

On 19 February 2024, the State Party submitted an incomplete report on the state of conservation of the property, followed by an updated report received on 26 March and available at https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/765/documents/, reporting the following:

• In 2022, efforts to establish a new ‘Volcanoes of Kamchatka’ National Park on the basis of the Kluchevskoy Nature Park (KNP) and South Kamchatka Nature Park (SKNP) were initiated, followed by a draft resolution of the Government of the Russian Federation, which is currently undergoing the relevant approval procedures;
• Following the establishment of the National Park in 2024, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment will determine its protected zone. The Vilyuchinskaya and Zhirovaya bays are expected to be included;
• The “Three Volcanoes Park” tourism resort project is being implemented outside the property with a view to reduce the anthropogenic load on the property by creating a regulated tourism and recreational infrastructure in the adjacent territory;
• The capacity and maximum permissible changes in the Valley of the Geysers, the most visited part of the Kronotsky State Nature Reserve (KSNR), will be re-evaluated in 2024. Similarly, the maximum permissible recreational capacity of the Nalychevo Nature Park (NNP) will also be evaluated as part of a 2024 pilot project;
• Work has been carried out on the functional zoning of the Nature Parks by establishing a special protection regime for each functional zone and regulations;

The joint World Heritage Centre/IUCN Reactive Monitoring mission requested for the property and originally planned for March 2022 had to be postponed and has not been rescheduled to date due to logistical constraints. On 7 May 2024, the State Party invited the joint World Heritage Centre/IUCN Reactive Monitoring mission to the property to be carried out in September 2024.

The insufficient information provided in response to the Committee’s previous requests, in particular with regard to ongoing tourism-related development and actions to control and limit unsustainable tourism, the improvement of the zoning of the property, the establishment of effective buffer zones around the components (Decisions 44 COM 7B.109 and 45 COM 7B.26), makes it difficult to assess the level of implementation of the Committee’s previous decision and the effectiveness of the measures taken by the State Party.

The ongoing process to establish a “Volcanoes of Kamchatka National Park” based on the existing SKNP and KNP is noted. This will upgrade the legal protection of two of the four Nature Parks included in the property from regional to federal status, responding to a long-standing recommendation of the Committee. However, it is unclear whether the new National Park will include all of the areas included in the property at the time of inscription on the World Heritage List. It is recalled that in its previous report, the State Party confirmed that the boundaries of SKNP had been changed and that certain areas included in the property had been removed from SKNP, including Vilyuchinskaya and Zhirovaya bays, thereby depriving them of their protection status and jeopardising the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of the property. It is therefore crucial that the new National Park encompasses all the areas included in the property at the time of inscription, including Vilyuchinskaya and Zhirovaya bays. While it is noted that the State Party mentions in its report that both areas ‘are expected to be included within the boundaries of the National Park’s protected zone’, it is unclear whether this zone is part of the proposed National Park or only in the buffer zone. Recalling that the World Heritage status requires that the legal protection of the property be adequate to protect its OUV, these areas should be included in the National Park and it should be ensured that the level of their protection would not permit the development of large-scale tourism infrastructure. In this respect, the World Heritage Centre and IUCN recommend that the Committee recall that inadequate legal protection constitutes a clear potential danger to the property as foreseen under Paragraph 180(b)(i) of the Operational Guidelines.

Recalling that the Three Volcanoes Park project was previously proposed to be partially located within the property, it is noted that the State Party now reports that it will be implemented outside of the property. It is recommended that the State Party be requested to provide more information on the current status and design of the project, including maps showing where infrastructure is planned in relation to the boundaries of the property. It is stressed that even if the footprint of the project falls outside of the boundaries of the property, the potential impacts on the OUV of the property, considering its proximity to the property, would still need to be assessed through an Environmental Impact Assessment, conducted in accordance with the Guidance and Toolkit for Impact Assessments in a World Heritage Context and submitted to the World Heritage Centre for review by IUCN before proceeding further with the project implementation.

Tourism development remains a significant potential threat to the property. It is therefore important for the Committee to recall the recommendation of the 2019 Reactive Monitoring mission to prepare a Master Plan for Tourism Development.

The information that work has been carried out on the functional zoning of the Nature Parks by establishing a special protection regime for each functional zone and regulations is noted. It needs to be recalled that the 2019 mission expressed concern that, despite the recommendation of the 2007 mission to increase the number of strict protection zones, changes to the zoning had significantly diminished the area of the property benefiting from a strict protection regime, and the mission considered that the zoning did not meet the requirements for the protection of the OUV. It is therefore recommended that the State Party be requested to provide detailed information on the functional zoning currently in place in all components of the property, as well as details of the regulations and special protection regimes in place for the different zones, to ensure that they meet the requirements for the protection of the property’s OUV.

Recalling the Committee’s request to ensure that the remaining recommendations of the 2019 Reactive Monitoring mission to the property are implemented by the end of 2023, following the development of an Action Plan to this end, it is regrettable that no information was provided on the implementation of these recommendations. The State Party should therefore inform the World Heritage Centre of the progress made in the implementation of the Action Plan, including the improvement of the zoning of the property, the establishment of effective buffer zones around the components and actions to control and limit unsustainable tourism.