Today is the Day of Charity. The Lake Baikal Foundation team expresses its gratitude to everyone who helps to preserve Lake Baikal and its inhabitants. Each project is a joint effort of a large number of people: employees and beneficiaries of the Foundation, members of the Board of Trustees and Supervisory Board, corporate partners, supporters and all people who care about nature conservation.
In 2024, thanks to our benefactors, we will continue to implement initiatives from separate waste collection to research of Baikal endemics for the sustainable development of the Baikal natural area.
Save the Bear!
This year the Foundation launched a new project to address the acute problem with waste: careless handling of food scraps leads to the fact that bears increasingly come out to people and get used to eating from garbage cans. To protect wild animals from such easy and unsafe prey, the Lake Baikal Foundation with the support of the Presidential Grants Fund and the World Around You Fund of Siberian Wellness developed a project to create specialized protected container sites. In conjunction with an educational campaign, the new sites will make it possible to return bears to their usual way of eating in the wild.
Youth Water Council
Students, young scientists and aspiring professionals from different regions of Russia joined forces on the water agenda. The Youth Water Council started its work under the guidance of the Foundation with the support of the Barrier Company.
Point No. 1
This year, the Lake Baikal Foundation allocated 1.5 million rubles to support the longest environmental monitoring – the project “Point No. 1”. Together with the World Around You Foundation of Siberian Wellness, the project has been supported for the seventh year – during this time, an extensive database of observations has been collected, and since 2021, with the participation of Yandex Cloud, an automatic system for analyzing photo and zooplankton samples based on a neural network is being implemented.
Trash Free National Parks
The program was launched in 2019, since then more than 10 tons of recyclable materials have been sent for recycling. The realization of such a large-scale project was made possible thanks to the Foundation’s corporate partners: The World Around You Foundation of Siberian Wellness, Barrier Company and LAB Industries. As part of the program, the “Test Trail” – an ecological trail with arranged parking lots, photo zones and stands on responsible waste management – was improved in the Zabaikalsky National Park. Construction began last year with the support of Lenta and the Dobry brand, and the infrastructure part of the project was completed this year.
The Baikal Nature Reserve School
Thanks to the Barrier Company, the Help Nearby and VK Dobro projects, the Baikal Reserve School continues its work this year. Modern equipment has appeared here: boxes for collecting and storing plastic lids, which will later be recycled into souvenirs; a pH meter to determine the acidity of water during experiments; a table and a laptop for a microscope; a multimedia projector. Immediate plans include the creation of an interactive bear that will explain how to handle wildlife to all visitors.
Reforestation
This fall, two reforestation campaigns will start at once: with the World Around You Foundation of Siberian Wellness and the Perekryostok retail chain. 20 hectares of forest will be planted in the areas affected by fires. Preparatory work is already underway.
Research of rare Baikal inhabitants
This year with the support of the World Around You Foundation Siberian Wellness Company continued 4 systematic studies of Baikal endemics: seals, eastern species of bustard, rare plants and cheetophore algae. In addition, to draw attention to the issues of Baikal seal conservation, together with scientists, a popular science movie is being filmed, which will premiere at the end of the year.
Strategy for the Development of the Podlemorye Nature Region
As part of the development and improvement of FGBU “Zapovednoe Podlemorye” with the support of the “World Around You” Foundation of Siberian Wellness Company and Barrier Company, a survey of vacationers and local residents on the development of the Zabaikalsky National Park was conducted. Based on the collected information, the issues on improvement of services and tourist infrastructure will be considered.
The Lake Baikal Foundation expresses its gratitude to the partners and all those who contribute to the preservation of the unique system of the amazing lake. The realized projects are everyone’s merit!