I´m Liliana from the Republic of Moldova and I’m 26 years old. I’ve been involved in environment protection activities for 4 years, but growing in a village surrounded by forests, plains and some lakes, I loved starting from childhood to admire wonderful trees, forest flowers and hills of different shapes. Even getting a diploma of master of economics, I’m trying to apply that knowledge in environment protection field.

Where do you come from? Please tell some general things about your country?

The Republic of Moldova is situated in Eastern Europe, quite small, but having a lot of beautiful and picturesque places. My country is well known for its good wines, tasteful fruits and vegetable and hospitable people that can organize very beautiful feasts and that still keep many nice traditions and customs.

What is the state of your home country’s environment?

Unfortunately because of economic problems and other priorities of people, the quality of environment is quite unsatisfactory. The water of rivers and lakes that some time ago was clean and clear, now is of bad quality. Forests that in the past were covering wider area of the country and including different traditional species for our country, now occupy a quite small area and include some introduced species that are not proper for this region. The soils that were fertile in the past, impressing by the crops that they were offering, now are more and more degraded and polluted. The agricultural and industrial pressure on lands is very high. One of the biggest problems is the small area of areas protected by State that is among the smallest in Europe.

What are you or your organisation doing to fight the environmental problems of your country?

I’m working in BIOTICA Ecological Society that is an environmental organization that is acting for many years, implementing successfully many projects connected with biological diversity conservation, environmental legislation, etc. Because of lack of financial sources, there was no field research conducted of the state of environment and its components on the territory of our country for a long time . That is why the experts of BIOTICA are trying to fill these gaps. There was organized research on potential zones that have a valuable biological diversity and that have to be protected by state. The once wonderful steppes now almost disappeared and only some small pieces of land with steppe vegetation is remaining. That is why BIOTICA researched the state of steppes in some regions and elaborated recommendations for their improvement and management plans for local authorities that are in charge with managing of these areas. At present we are interested also in high nature value farmland areas identification and protection, because it is one of the commitments taken by the country by signing different international agreements. However it is not implemented yet. Another important thing on what BIOTICA is working is the creation of the ecological network as an important mean to conserve the biological diversity and to improve the agro-ecological environment. To protect the environment it is also necessary to have a good legislative framework, that could regulate the activities that can affect the environment state. BIOTICA proposed numerous amendments to Moldavian environmental drafts: "On Protective Zones of Rivers and Water Bodies," "On Wildlife," "On Environmental Impact Assessment Law", “On Drinking Water”, “On biosafety”, etc.

What could people do?

All we do won´t be successful, if the local population does not understand that they should also be involved in protective activities. In all our projects we are working together with representatives of the local population, public authorities and other relevant bodies. That helps to get them involved in those activities after projects end - then they will also take responsibility for nature. Young people are eager to participate in local actions organized by us and are interested in protecting what they did. Maybe young people should take the responsibility in their hands for concrete actions. They can start from the local level and continuing to regional, national and international. Other important things are cooperation and experience exchange. Even if countries are different and people have various problems, we have one environment and one goal – to protect it and that we should do together.