In the Durlesti forest company, a person who has rented a hectare of forest for a period of 30 years appropriated a much larger area and erected a construction there, affecting thus the environment and destroying trees and bushes. Deputy minister of the environment Lazar Chirica, in a news conference at IPN, said this is a very serious irregularity about which they informed the Prosecutor’s Office, to which they transmitted all the materials collected following inspections on the spot.

Lazar Chirica stated that the lease for a hectare of forest owned by the Durlesti forest company was signed in 2009. The lessee was to pay over 4,000 lei a year for this land. It later became known that the man started to erect buildings in the forest and he was fined for this. In several years, the person filed an application, asking to be allowed to put up a cabin on that territory, which was actually to be built somewhere else, without affecting the environment in the forest. After he got an authorization, he built an impressive foundation from concrete for the cabin, a pool and an asphalt road from the national road M1 inside the forest.

The deputy minister said a concrete fence that is over 2 meters in height was built on both sides of the road to keep the bank that was cut. Over 50 trees and many bushes were cut to widen the old country road. The man does not have a permit for asphalting the road and for the erected constructions.

Several days ago, Lazar Chirica, inspectors of the State Inspectorate and of Construction Inspectorate and the head of the Ecologist Movement of Moldova Alecu Renita went to the Durlesti forest company to examine the situation on the spot. Neither the deputy minister nor Alecu Renita and the present journalists were allowed to enter. The inspectors had to jump over the fence so as to be able to carry out an assessment.

Alecu Renita said the situation is ridiculous as he was declared a persona non grata on the territory of the construction within the Durlesti forest company. The given abuse is not the only one and the state loses not only money by leasing out forests at derisory prices, but also the forest stock, which is being destroyed by those who rent areas in forests.

Alecu Renita noted he was accused of targeting the investments made by the people in the country,  but he actually urges those who now destroy the forests by renting them to invest in villages and to rent degrading land so as to plant trees and do what they want there.