The forest environmental frontier in Russia: Between sustainable forest management discourses and 'wood mining' practice.

With 20% of the world's forests, Russia has global potential in bioeconomy development, biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation. However, unsustainable forest management based on 'wood mining' reduces this potential. Based on document analysis, participant observations and interviews, this article shows how non-state actors-environmental NGOs and forest companies-address forest resource depletion and primary forest loss in Russia.