site.btaForester of the Year 2024 Awards Presented in Sofia

The 2024 Forester of the Year Awards were presented at an official ceremony at Sofia’s Central Military Club on Monday. This took place after the official opening of the 100th edition of the Forest Week, which was held in front of the St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral with a solemn prayer service, officiated by Bulgarian Patriarch and Metropolitan of Sofia Daniil, and addresses from President Rumen Radev and Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Stoyan Toshev.

Engineer Ivan Rizov, Deputy Director of the State Forestry Farm Katuntsi, was named Forester of the Year 2024.

The award for overall contribution to forestry was awarded posthumously to Yordan Bobonkov. Victor Mihaylov, Deputy Director of the Regional Forest Directorate in Ruse, was also recognized for his overall contribution.

The award for control of forest protection activities for 2024 went to Nikolay Georgiev, chief specialist and forest inspector at the Regional Forest Directorate - Varna.

The award for significant contribution to the promotion and enhancement of the image of the forester profession was awarded to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Evgeni Tsavkov, Head of the Department of Arboriculture at the University of Forestry. He said that 7,462 students have graduated since 1925 in forestry and he was honoured to be one of them.

University of Forestry Chancellor Hristo Mihaylov recalled that higher forestry education in Bulgaria also celebrates its 100th anniversary exactly in a month - on May 7. In his words, “besides being happy for the forest we have, we should also be concerned”. The forestry sector and the Bulgarian forest require much more determination, courage, professionalism and responsibility, Mihaylov said.

Deputy Minister of Education and Science Tanya Mihailova stressed that two of the six national high schools in our country teach forestry.