On the harm caused to the environment

Many have already encountered situations where, for violating environmental legislation, not only administrative measures were applied to the violator, but also an act was drawn up establishing the fact of damage to the environment, followed by a claim for compensation for the damage caused to the environment.

What is damage caused to the environment?

According to the Law of the Republic of Belarus "On Environmental Protection", damage caused to the environment is a monetarily assessed negative change in the environment or individual components of the natural environment, natural or natural-anthropogenic objects, expressed in their pollution, degradation, depletion, damage, destruction, illegal extraction (mining) and (or) other deterioration of their condition, as a result of harmful impact on the environment associated with violation of legislation on environmental protection and rational use of natural resources.

The complete list of facts that form the basis for establishing damage caused to the environment is quite extensive and is set out in the Resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus dated April 11, 2022 No. 219. This same resolution defines the rates for determining the amount of damage caused to the environment and the procedure for its calculation.

For 11 months of 2025, the Miory District Inspectorate of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection established 11 facts of causing damage to the environment for a total amount of 6,908 rubles. Of these, 4 facts of causing damage are related to the illegal removal of trees, 3 – to the pollution of the environment with waste, 2 – to the extraction of minerals without obtaining documents that are the legal basis for subsoil use, 1 – to land pollution, 1 – to emissions of pollutants into the atmosphere from stationary emission sources with exceeding the established permissible emission standards for pollutants into the atmosphere in the permit.

Chief Specialist of the Miory District Inspectorate of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Voevodov A.E.