administered by numerous Union and republican ministries.3
Even agriculture, in a modern, highly populated society, is liable to degrade the environment by displacing animal life, reclaiming swamps or forests, and disseminating chemical fertilizers and killers of weeds and pests.4 Soviet law sets out to determine what utilization of the land is ecologically safe. There is a State Commission for Chemical Means of Struggle against Pests, Plant Diseases, and Weeds, which tests chemicals before use and assesses their impact on the ecology.
Industry, of course, presents even more severe problems. As little as 1 to 1-1/2 percent of raw material may appear in the finished product, the remainder being waste that requires disposition. Perhaps five billion tons of waste accumulate every year in the Soviet Union.5 Wastes may be burned, neutralized, or buried; burial requires safeguarding of population centers, recreational areas, and surface or subterranean waters. Dangerous wastes are, buried in pits with walls of either concrete or clay.
Environmental problems are, plainly, insensitive to national frontiers. The 1972 Stockholm Declaration on the Human Environment, the Global Environmental Protection Strategy, and the Global Nature Charter of the United Nations, are all being put into effect in the U.S.S.R., according to Kolbasov, 1988a.6 Accordingly, in 1980 the Supreme Soviet adopted a fundamental law "On Protecting and Utilizing the Animal Kingdom;" the republics have similar laws. These laws, compared to previous legislation, set more stringent requirements for the preservation of the habitats of wild animals, their migration routes, and conditions for the support of the variety of species. The regulation of hunting, fishing, and other forms of exploitation has, according to Kolbasov 1988a, also been improved. However, Kolbasov admits that the measures to "preserve" rare and endangered species include banning any use o...