In 2019 Moscow recognized “the greenest metropolis in the world” in terms of the number of parks per capita, in 2021 the same thought voiced Mayor of Moscow Sergei Sobyanin on your blog. Every year, city authorities spend billions of rubles on landscaping, new trees, and the improvement of parks and natural areas. Which means someone is making money off of it.
Now there are several greening programs in the capital. For example, “Our tree” – according to the idea of officials, any family after the birth of a child can plant a nominal tree in parks and forest parks for free. There is also the Million Trees program – since 2014 and to this day, Muscovites have been submitting applications for landscaping their yards through the Active Citizen project.
MSK1.RU studied the documents and found out that about half of all contracts for landscaping in Moscow are carried out by the same company, which belongs to a famous billionaire Konstantin Goloshchapov. He is considered close to Vladimir Putin. In addition to him, a large Moscow developer and a person associated with the architect of the scandalous palace in Gelendzhik.
Rates vary from contract to contract. Sometimes it depends on different parameters – the height or girth of the trunk. For example, within the framework of the Our Tree program, lindens are purchased at a price 77 thousand rubles for a seedling
Lindens for 300 and 70 thousand are different. In the north of Moscow, the European variety “Pallida” was planted, 5–7 meters high and with a trunk girth of 40–45 centimeters. According to Our Tree, lindens are planted simpler and lower – 1.5–2 meters high (the girth of the trunk is not specified in the documentation). At the same time, the first one can be bought directly at the nursery for almost three times cheaper – for 115 thousandand the second one can be found for 5 thousand rubles.
For this illustration, we took trees from the Savvateev Nursery, one of the largest suppliers of seedlings in Moscow and the region. It belongs to the editor-in-chief and general director of the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper Vladimir Sungorkin and his relatives – Irina Savvateeva and her brother Alexander.
And sometimes the same trees under different contracts for some reason cost differently. For example, in the contract for the landscaping of the largest parks, “common spruce” costs about 6 thousand rubles for a seedling In the contract for the landscaping of New Moscow, exactly the same spruce – a little more 1200 rubles for a seedling According to the Our Tree program, exactly the same spruce will be planted for 40 thousand rubles for a seedling We are talking about spruce 1.5-2 meters high, its breed is not critical – it can be “Korean”, “coniferous”, “ordinary” or even replaced by some “equivalent”, follows from the project estimates.
Let’s talk a little about each. Federal State Budgetary Institution “Roslesinforg” is a government organization that is engaged in “solving forest accounting problems in the interests of the state.” In Moscow, Roslesinforg won contracts for cadastral registration of forest areas. It turns out that it costs serious money – more than two billion rubles.
But the company “Riviera” is really a major player in the “green” market. Limes for 322 thousand, about which we talked above, were planted by them. Together with the Rivierastroy company, founded by Riviera itself, this organization won contracts worth 1.5 billion rubles. The company plants trees, which it sells itself, in its Imperial Garden nursery, which is located on Novorizhskoye Highway. But for ordinary people, seedlings are much cheaper than for the state: for example, the same linden trees for 322 thousand there sell for 233 thousand.
The general director of Riviera is Alexander America, he holds the same position in the Amethyst company. Amethyst is owned by Alexey Kozlovsky. He is also a co-founder of the Center Development company (formerly known as INCOM-Center LLC) – its previous owner is businessman Sergei Kozlovsky, the possible father of Alexei Sergeyevich.
Another likely son of Sergei Kozlovsky is Denis. In the company of Denis Kozlovsky “Rivieravitta”, one of the co-founders used to be Ruslan Myakishev, one of the shareholders of “Riviera”. Denis Kozlovsky also has a joint business with another – albeit already former – shareholder of Riviera – Ruslan Sargsyan. Together they manage the company “Foodcenter”, which is engaged in the construction of real estate.
It turns out that the current and former owners of Riviera used to have a business associated with Sergei Kozlovsky. He himself is known as the owner of the INCOM-Real Estate Corporation. It is one of the leaders in the Russian market of real estate services and the largest developer of suburban real estate in the Moscow region. Kozlovsky sells luxury suburban real estate under the Villagio Estate brand.
Another interesting and major landscaping contractor is Petersburg Landscape Architectural Studio. Together with the associated companies FRMAid and Gorzelenkhoz, this contractor won contracts worth more than 2 billion rubles. The owner and CEO of Petersburg Landscape Alexander Bolshakov was a co-founder of FRMade from 2013 to 2017 and Gorzelenkhoz from 2010 to 2016.
Bolshakov has another interesting business – he was a co-founder of the Soyuzny commercial bank. In 2018, the Central Bank revoked Soyuzny’s license, including for “numerous violations of the law and regulations of the Bank of Russia in the field of combating the legalization (laundering) of proceeds from crime and the financing of terrorism”
The largest owner of this bank is Lanfranco Cirillo, he is called the architect of the infamous “Putin’s Palace” in Gelendzhik. According to Meduza (recognized as a foreign agent) with reference to an Italian magazine, Cirillo began working in Russia in the nineties, building houses for the president of Lukoil Vagit Alekperova and other businessmen. He is also one of the heroes of our big investigation about who owns real estate in Moscow City towers.
Another major founder of this bank is Tatyana Kuznetsova, she, judging by the data of “KO”, is the wife of the ex-colonel of the FSO Oleg Kuznetsov. It is she, as journalists write, who can control the palace in Gelendzhik.
The second place in the top of major contractors of Mospriroda is occupied by Tekhstroy Industriya, which is engaged in the production of rolled lawns. The co-founders of Techstroy are very fond of sports: for example, Sergey Kryuchkov is the president of the Tiger golf club, and Oleg Sukhorenko has his own Alpine Ice sports and leisure center. The company won contracts from Mospriroda, for example, for “environmental rehabilitation” Bitsevsky forest and restoration of ponds in the park “Pokrovskoe Streshnevo”.
It is also important to note that these landings are not always carried out with due attention to the environment. The point is not only that wild natural areas are being landscaped in the capital without a clear examination and published documentation, as it is now happening with “Bitsevsky Forest” and Pokrovskoe Streshnevo. And the fact that the Moscow authorities have not yet adopted an environmental strategy until 2030 – “Moscow. Let’s save nature by developing the city” (in 2017 published only her project). This topic was only one ruling issuedin which “improving the quality of the environment” is declared a priority.