JSC NCR set up an environmental Autonomous Nonprofit Organisation North Caucasian Nature Preservation and Protection Center (ANO Caucasian Nature Center), which key project shall be recovery of persian leopard populations in the North Caucasus. This was announced by the Deputy Chairman of the Government of Russia Alexander Khloponin during his video-conference with Umar Semyonov, Director of the Center for Leopard Recovery in the Caucasus, where on June 12, a pair of persian leopards brought forth three kittens.

‘I believe it was an extremely correct decision to attract the management company of the tourism cluster to implement environmental initiatives, especially as JSC NCR has some experience in implementing environmental projects in the region. It is a global practice — when large developers and management companies, jointly with the government, support environmental initiatives to preserve the pristine condition of the territories, where their projects are being implemented,’ the Vice Prime Minister said.

As Oleg Gorchev, the Director General of JSC NCR, reported, the Board of Guardians of ANO Caucasian Nature Center was formed of the persons, who are prominent in the country and have repeatedly proved their commitment to the ideals of environmental awareness and nature protection activities. ‘The first session of the Board of Guardians shall be held in early July. There, we shall choose the composition of the Board of Guardians and its Chairman, as well as present the Strategy of ANO Caucasian Nature Center, which defines the precise algorithms of implementation of projects of organisation,’ Oleg Gorchev added.

‘Eco-tourism, due to its popularity in the world, should become one of the main generators of the tourist flow at the sites of the tourism cluster being established in the summer season. That is why, it is very important to take care of the biodiversity in the region, when implementing large-scale infrastructure projects, such as ours,’ he emphasised.

ANO Caucasian Nature Center has already received the status of co-contractor in the Program on restoring the persian leopard in the Caucasus within the Major Activities Plan to hold the Year of Ecology in Russia in 2017. The organisation will take part in the implementation of a set of events aimed at accelerating the pace of leopard reintroduction in the wild and the establishment of a sustainable self-reproducing natural population of this rare predator in the Caucasus region. The organisation will work closely with all major participants in the laborious process of the return of the persian leopard into the nature of the North Caucasus: Ministry of Natural Resources of Russia, Russian Academy of Sciences, World Wildlife Fund (WWF Russia) and Center for Leopard Recovery in the Caucasus.

The autonomous organisation also plans to implement other nature protection projects in the North Caucasus, including the formation of a stable population of European bison, preservation of box forests in the region, etc. An important direction of work of ANO Caucasian Nature Center will also be formation of ecological consciousness among young people of the North Caucasus, attracting environmentally responsible citizens of Russia and Russian companies to implementation of nature protection projects.