“Kedr” talked about the main lobbyists of hunting in the State Duma and the Federation Council

A group of Okhota lobbyists was formed in the State Duma and the Federation Council. They propose bills that allow the killing of animals, including those listed in the Red Book. The “Kedr” publication together with the “DumaBingo” lobbying project tells about them.

Vladyslav Reznyk, a member of the State Duma from United Russia, is the biggest lobbyist for hunting among parliamentarians. He is listed as the first co-author of four significant draft laws on hunting, three of which have already been adopted. Reznyk is a co-founder of the Mountain Hunters Club, which has many photos of killed animals on its website. The organization consists of more than 900 people, including Russian deputies and large businessmen.

The co-author of all four bills is Ryfat Shaikhutdinov, a member of the Duma faction of the LDPR. In 2017, he received the internal award of the Mountain Hunters Club as “one of the luckiest hunters”. Among the other permanent co-authors of bills on the killing of animals are the United Russians Nikolay Nikolaev and Yevgeny Moskvychev.

In addition to them, ardent hunters Igor Shubin from “United Russia” and Alexander Remezkov from SRZP, as well as senators Viktor Novozhilov, Gennady Emelyanov and Aleksey Kondratenko participated in the drafting of bills.

Among the members of the Federation Council, the researchers noted Vladimir Lebedev, the co-author of three laws on the killing of animals and the head of the board of the “Velikovskoe” hunters’ and fishermen’s society. According to Lebedev, “Velykovskoye” is a hunting club consisting of “partners and friends”. The hunting farm occupies one hundred thousand hectares of land, on which they offer to kill spotted deer, bears, wild boars, grouse and other animals.

In less than three years, hunting lobbyists led by Reznyk proposed to allow enclosure hunting, kill red-listed animals, hunt in forest parks near populated areas, and not hold auctions to extend hunting relations with landlords. These draft laws have already been adopted and entered into force.

In 2022, the lobbyists proposed not to carry out an environmental examination of quotas for killing animals and oblige tenants to provide them: the number of animals killed should be at least 50% of the established quotas. This bill is still under consideration in the State Duma.