Environmental supervision reveals 12,295 violations in 2022

Illegal forest felling, waste management violations and breaches of laws on minerals were among environmental infringements identified by state supervision across Georgia over the past year, the Environmental Protection Ministry said on Friday.

The Ministry’s Department of Environmental Supervision said it had identified 12,295 cases of environmental violations in 2022, with 509 of the facts qualifying as criminal offences.

Statistics of cases established by supervision over the year included: 

• 3,881 facts of illegal forest use
• 1,802 violations of forest legislation
• 1,298 violations in the transportation of timber
• 781 violations of technical regulations by sawmills
• 2,718 violations of the Waste Management Code
• 1,843 violations of laws on air quality
• 1,103 violations of fishing and hunting laws
• 754 violations of mineral laws
• 397 violations of land laws 
• 366 violations of laws and permits related to water

The body also said the Department had detected 906 facts of other types of environmental violations.

Most of the combined cases - 2,730 - were found in the eastern Kakheti region, while the figure stood at 842 in the capital of Tbilisi.