Yesterday, Chinese scientists from Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Changchun, and several other cities spent the day getting acquainted with the activities of the Karelian Research Centre RAS and visited the educational facility "Museum of Applied Environmental Research". They were guided on the tour by KarRC RAS scientists Nadezhda Nikolaeva, Stanislav Kutenkov, Sergey Simonov, and Aleksey Tolstikov, who informed the guests about some of their institute’s research lines.
At the Museum of Applied Environmental Research
The next event on the agenda was a roundtable session at which Chinese and Karelian scientists presented the history and current activities of the geographical societies of China and Karelia, key areas of scientific research, publishing activities, and the popularization of scientific knowledge. The scientists made a number of scientific presentations, exchanged opinions, and discussed potential further contacts.
Wang Dai, Executive Director of the Geographical Society of China, informed that the Geographical Society of China was founded in 1909, much later than the Russian Geographical Society, which was established in 1845. Yet, having come a long way from its founding to the present day, the Geographical Society of China is one of the oldest non-governmental organizations in China and actively works to popularize and disseminate geographical knowledge both inside the country and across the world. The Society has regional branches in various provinces and autonomous regions of China and includes 22 commissions, each specializing in a specific area of geographical science: economic geography, hydrography, physical geography, cartography and geoinformatics, and others.
According to Wang Dai, the Geographical Society of China sponsors 18 periodicals, four of which are in English. The society’s international cooperation includes active collaboration with the Russian Geographical Society, such as academic visits, scientific expeditions, and joint events with partners from Russia.
A presentation on the activities of the Karelian Branch of the Russian Geographical Society was given by Aleksey Tolstikov, Branch Chairman and Head of the Geography and Hydrology Laboratory at the Northern Water Problems Institute KarRC RAS. He highlighted several achievements and projects implemented in Karelia with the support of the Russian Geographical Society. These include the study and creation of a unified database of waterfalls in North European Russia, organization of public educational events such as the Geographic Dictation, and publication of scientific and popular science materials. He also mentioned the RGS’s project to create a traveling exhibition "K.I. Arsenyev – Prominent Geographer, Statistician, and One of the Organizers of the Russian Imperial Geographical Society". This two-year project will be completed on July 1, 2026. Be reminded that Konstantin Arsenyev is closely connected with the history of Karelia and Petrozavodsk.
After the presentations on the activities of the geographical societies, Alexandra Smirnova, Head of the KarRC RAS Department for International Cooperation, gave an overview of the Centre's international activities. The next speaker, Li Ye, Associate Professor at the School of Geographical Sciences of East China Normal University, reported research findings on PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) emissions in China. Natalia Kalinkina, Leading Researcher at the Hydrobiology Laboratory of the KarRC RAS Northern Water Problems Institute, spoke about the mechanisms of eutrophication in Karelian water bodies under climate warming. Boris Raevsky, Director of the KarRC RAS Forest Research Institute and Leading Researcher at the Laboratory of Environmental Monitoring and Modeling of the Department for Multidisciplinary Research, concentrated in his talk on the digital mapping of land cover and land use in federal-level protected areas of Karelia.
Chinese participants also made presentations on the evolutionary mechanisms, resilience characteristics, and factors governing the resilience of agriculture in Northeast China, as well as urbanization and vegetation cover in Russia.
Aleksey Tolstikov, Head of the Russian Geographical Society in Karelia, noted the scientific significance of the presented research. According to him, Karelian and Chinese scientists generally use the same methods and are moving along the same vector, while the scope and scale of the work carried out by Chinese colleagues is particularly impressive.
Wrapping up the roundtable, Alexander Slabunov, KarRC RAS Deputy Director General for Science Administration, said it was an interesting meeting, where the most relevant and promising areas of environmental research for the Chinese party were highlighted.
The visit of the Chinese delegation continues the development of the Karelian Research Centre’s contacts with scientists of the People's Republic of China, facilitating the establishment of long-term scientific relations between researchers of both countries and expanding the range of common scientific interests.
