New prospects in Donuzlav

The fate of the western coast of the Crimea is once again on the agenda after President Yushchenko canceled an earlier decision passed on Oct. 23, 2005, to set up the Donuzlav Crimean Marine Industrial Transportation Complex. This project, valued at roughly 2.5 billion hryvnias, envisaged the construction of a seaport with 12 terminals, an airport, highway, and a 104-kilometer-long railroad.

However, experts at the Crimean Academy of Sciences have estimated that this would result in the loss of biological and recreational resources totaling over 8 billion hryvnias. According to an official announcement of the Ukrainian president’s representation in the Crimea, the previous decision was rescinded thanks to the efforts of the public, media representatives, and the presidential representation in the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea.

Members of councils on all levels in the region decided that the western Crimean seacoast must develop as a resort area. Their task is to continue opposing any ecologically harmful industrial construction projects. To this end they resolved to begin drafting a national development program for western Crimea. The main task of the council members’ meeting was to unite the efforts of territorial communities and develop a new regional development concept.

It was also decided to formulate concrete measures under the resort and recreation program, measures to ensure ecological safety, and state financing of a feasibility study of the resort and recreational development of western Crimea, particularly the Donuzlav area. According to Crimea’s Agricultural Policy Minister Oleh Rusetsky, Saky and Chornomorsky raions must enforce a moratorium on the distribution of land for the construction of seaside cottages and analyze the expediency of sand extraction on the territory of Donuzlav. The chairman of the Chornomorske District Council, Mykola Omeliansky, proposed setting up fish and mussel farms in the area. He said that there are many investors willing to inject money into this industry.

During the meeting the Crimean Academy of Sciences submitted a draft project on the development of Tarkhankut’s ecospheric zone based in Donuzlav. Scientists have proposed plans for ecoparks and resort complexes. This project deals with all aspects of power and water supplies and domestic waste management. The scientists at the meeting pointed out that the optimum number of vacationers who can be accommodated in this region is 50,000. The meeting also heard that Russia and France are prepared to sponsor such a project, provided all paperwork issues are resolved. Investments in the resort development of this region are expected to reach 350 million euros.

The meeting participants resolved to include expenditures on creating regional resort development programs in the budgets of Yevpatoria, the large villages of Myrny, Novoozerne, and Zaozerne, and Saky and Chornomorske raions. Local authorities will also request the Crimean parliament to form a task force that will develop a complex development program and draw up a letter to the Ukrainian leadership about developing such a program on the national level.

According to reports from the Crimea, the authors of the seaport project have no intentions of abandoning their idea. They believe that the president’s repeal of the ukase indicates only that the state has denied its support to the project. The project initiators say they will be issuing an international tender call and argue that it has real advantages over the project to develop the region only as a resort area, because a resort region must also be provided with intensive transportation, including marine transport. A region like Donuzlav simply cannot exist without a seaport. The crux of the matter is what kind of port and what purposes it will serve.

Crimean Prime Minister Viktor Plakida believes that “the Donuzlav issue remains open” and that the question of building an industrial transportation complex by Lake Donuzlav in Yevpatoria requires further deliberation by ecologists and other experts. He made this statement at a press conference in Symferopil. Plakida declared that the Crimean government wants to hire experts to produce a feasibility study on the long-term (20-25 years) prospects of developing a number of territories on the peninsula. He stressed that he also has in mind interchanges, seaports, and air fields that have a working potential but which have lost their former roles and importance and are in need of modernization.

The Crimean prime minister also indicated that there are discrepancies in the ecological and other expert findings on the port construction project, and noted that the seaports in Kerch are struggling to deal with a 180-184 percent load. A completed analysis shows that world transportation corridors traversing Crimean seaports have somewhat lost their importance and have to be revised.

“Any country with a defined area of water uses it actively in combination with a coastal infrastructure, but the council members’ hearings in Yevpatoria have shown that people are still not ready to create this link. However, this issue is not closed, it is still on the table, although today’s decision to cancel the earlier project was obviously the correct one,” Plakida pointed out.