This material was prepared as a result of the 2026 EECCA Youth Climate Policy Lab*, an online training programme organised by the Climate Action Network Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia (CAN EECCA) with the support of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES)
Archaeologists are concerned not only with ancient events, dating back hundreds or thousands of years. Global problems of the present, such as the climate crisis, equally occupy the field’s attention. It is no surprise then that a growing number of archaeologists are turning their efforts toward the climate crisis – a problem that is increasingly difficult to ignore. What does archaeology have to do with contemporary climate change? The answers are various, and more of them are emerging as the discipline finds its footing in the climate fight. One of these answers connects wetland archaeology with peatland restoration efforts in Belarus and worldwide.
Role of archaeology in climate adaptation
While many of us look to scientists to provide a miraculous solution which will fix the environment, archaeology is probably not the first discipline which comes to mind as a source of solutions. Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) names technological rather than social innovation as the key solution to accelerate adoption of climate mitigation practices. This perspective is quite advantageous for proponents of exponential economic growth (now rebranded as “green” growth), and for large fossil fuel companies that lobby technology-based solutions to the climate crisis.
The problem is that the current unprecedented environmental crisis was generated in the last two hundred years by industrial capitalism and the growth of consumerism. Technological innovation cannot succeed against global warming without socio-economic transformations. So, archaeologists and historians decided that their disciplines must join the fight against the climate crisis – for example, see the works by Peter Mitchell, Þóra Pétursdóttir, Adam Izdebski and colleagues. They advocate that stories about the past can contribute to solving present-day problems, including development of sustainable policies and risk management strategies. Archaeology is by default focused on the ecological footprint of human activity. It deals with processes that occur over long periods of time, thus allowing to accumulate knowledge extending far beyond any single person’s lifetime, and a long-term perspective. If the final barrier to climate adaptation is our inability to conceive a world radically different from the one we live in, it is enough to look into the past to see alternative ways of living on the planet.
The role of peatlands in climate resilience and Belarusian culture
Globally, peatlands store an amount equivalent to two-thirds of the total atmospheric carbon. Apart from storing carbon, peatlands are vital for the sustainability of the biosphere. In Belarus, peatlands cover about 12% of the country, providing water supply for rivers and lakes, carbon storage, and home for diverse wildlife. The latter includes 40% of birds, 35% of insects, and 15% of wild plant endangered species listed in the Red Book of the Republic of Belarus. Peatlands provide economic and recreational benefits to local communities in the form of cranberry and medicinal plant foraging. They also serve as ecotourism hotspots, a prime example of which is the Belarusian Jelnia (Yelnya) raised bog.
Belarus is often described as a land of marshes and forests. Peatlands play an important role in Belarusian culture as evident from their central place in the classic works of fiction, such as “King Stakh’s Wild Hunt” by Uladzimir Karatkievich and “People of the Marsh” by Ivan Mielež. In the past, wetlands provided hay, berries, reed for roofs, fertilizer for fields, willows for wickerwork and swamp ore, the emergent use of which marked the beginning of the Iron Age in Belarus. The unique traditional culture of the peatland-rich region in the south of Belarus, Palessie, owes to the isolating wetland landscape. Evidently, apart from their crucial role in the cooling of the climate, peatlands are an integral part of Belarusian culture. And it is true not only for symbolic culture.
UK: Peatland’s role in conserving cultural heritage
Peatlands conserve not only natural ecosystems, but also material culture in the form of archaeological remains trapped in them. Apart from being valuable carbon stores and biodiversity hotspots, peatlands have a high potential to preserve a rich variety of archaeological and palaeoenvironmental material due to waterlogged conditions and limited disturbance by modern human activity. Previously, it was considered that there was a conflict between the needs to preserve cultural heritage sites and people’s access to them, and the needs to preserve natural landscapes through rewilding and creation of nature reserves. However, in Britain this tension is now being questioned.
A 2026 Historic England report investigated how the historic environment can positively contribute to nature recovery aims, particularly to biodiversity gain. For example, the aims of historic and natural conservation seem to broadly align for peatland and wetland sites. Drainage of peatland results in dewatering and erosion, which not only destroys wetland ecosystems and compromises carbon stores, but leads to degradation of artifacts and ecofacts, particularly organic remains such as bone, wood and pollen. Rewetting peatlands brings benefits both for the preservation of ancient material and for nature recovery and climate mitigation.
The combination of wildlife and historic environment attracts more visitors to sites that are open to tourists. It is beneficial to change the narrative of the historic environment as a blocker for change to an opportunity, to communicate archaeology’s potential to nature recovery practitioners and ultimately to integrate the management of natural and historic environments.
Belarus: Example of Asaviec site and Kryvina peat bog:
The Neolithic sites of Kryvina peatbog in the north of Belarus give a glimpse into a past world different from our own, where agriculture and husbandry was not a dominant way of life. In the past, forests and lakes were rich with wildlife, supporting prolonged survival of hunter-fisher-gatherer lifestyles. Species that are now in the Red Book of the Republic of Belarus were common – among them water chestnut and European pond turtle, brown bear, European bison, and badger. A third of the bird and mammal species identified at Asaviec 2 are now in the Red Book or extinct.
Most of the known Kryvina peatbog sites are fully or partially covered with peat. This allowed plant remains, animal bone and antler and artifacts made from these materials to survive there for 3-7 thousand years. Remarkable preservation of organic materials under peat made these sites famous for the richness of unique finds. Draining of the peat bog in the mid-20th century has triggered decay of organic artifacts, with no wood artifacts surviving in the topmost four layers, and the condition of the bone, antler, and amber artifacts rapidly deteriorating. Damage to peatland sites also comes through peat fires and industrial extraction of peat. Two Kryvina peat bog settlements were damaged by outcrop mines in the 1970s, and the location of another one was lost in 1939, following a peat fire. The indirect result of human actions – global warming – also affects peatlands through drying and higher susceptibility to fires. This is part of the worldwide trend, where destruction of cultural records is occurring due to thawing of permafrost, flooding, fires, coastal erosion, rising sea levels, changes in soil chemistry, structure and movement. This destruction leads not only to the loss of archaeological data, but also impacts the sense of identity of the communities connected to this material culture.
The example of Kryvina peat bog sites demonstrates how peatland rewetting and protection benefit both the natural and historic environment. Restored peatlands have already become hotspots for eco-tourism, and their economic and cultural potential may be enhanced through their role as historic attractions, preserving sites from distant past with unique archaeological record.
Peatland rewetting in Belarus needs further effort
Until the last decade of the twentieth century, peatlands were primarily seen in Belarus as industrial and agricultural resources. Belarus still remains the leading world producer of fuel peat briquettes. Peatland (as well as land, forests and natural complexes) degradation from unsustainably use and drainage in the second half of the 20th century was recognized as a major threat to the national security of the country in 2010s. Potential of peatland landscape in positioning of Belarus as an international tourism destination was also recognized, and development of ecotourism was proposed among the measures to be taken in order to secure peatland conservation and sustainable use. Efforts to rewet peatlands were undertaken, reviving about 89,400 ha or 17% of the total degraded peatland area. Rewetted peatlands saw increase in biodiversity and return of diverse wetland bird colonies, providing new opportunities for birdwatching, ecotourism and research. However, around 500,000 ha of drained peatland still requires restoration, and further effort is crucial in the light of decreasing water reservoirs in the country.
Instead, the recent news from Belarusian government media announced the plan to reconstruct drainage systems and meliorate or “reclaim” for agriculture over 430,000 hectares of wetland over the next five years. This alleged “land improvement” will include removal of tree and shrub vegetation. Government-owned Sputnik Belarus highlighted concerns of ecologists related to melioration and admitted abnormally low air humidity, drying up of smaller water bodies, and the catastrophic drop in river levels among the growing threats to the country’s water security. However, it insisted that wetland drainage in Soviet times was conducted improperly. By contrast, according to Sputnik Belarus, new melioration activities will avoid past mistakes, and will preserve natural habitats – however, how this would be achieved, was not explained.
This melioration plan not only undermines the potential of peatland landscapes to preserve the climate, biodiversity and cultural heritage, but contradicts the country’s international promises. Belarusian updated Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 42% by 2035 compared to 1990, or by 47% if the country receives international support, gains access to carbon markets and sees sanctions lifted. Both targets include the land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) sector, and the conditional one explicitly depends on “maintaining the achieved level of absorption capacity of forests and other ecosystems”. In other words, Belarus’s climate ambitions rest heavily on its natural carbon sinks, peatlands among them. Yet peatlands receive only a passing mention: the NDC refers to the national strategy for the conservation and sustainable use of peatlands and pledges ecological rehabilitation of at least 10,000 hectares of disturbed bogs between 2015 and 2030. This is a modest figure next to the roughly 500,000 hectares of drained peatland still awaiting restoration, and it sits poorly with the announced plans to “reclaim” over 430,000 hectares of wetland. The document says nothing about drainage or melioration, and it does not consider peatlands as repositories of archaeological heritage or as part of the identity of the communities living around them. Peatlands appear in it as an item of carbon accounting rather than as landscapes where climate, biodiversity and history meet.
Existing Belarusian laws related to wetlands do not account for the interconnection of natural and cultural heritage needs, either. In 2019 a “Law on the Protection and Use of Peatlands” was introduced in Belarus, which established the legal framework for the protection of peatlands. Heritage management and perspectives on the role of peatlands in the preservation of symbolic and material culture, and the identity of local communities, were absent from it. The “National Tourism Development Strategy until 2035” mentioned development of ecotourism among priorities, and the rich natural potential of the country, including wetlands, among the strengths of Belarusian tourism. This strategy could further benefit from exploring the interconnection of natural and historic environments management. Future planning should also recognize the need to progress from nature protection to nature recovery, and the advantages it will bring for the economy of the country and the wellbeing of its inhabitants.
Peatlands present a new, and likely not the only, example where the interests of climate, biodiversity and archaeology overlap. Meloration decisions concern not only agriculture, but will also have a long-lasting impact on whether the region’s unique history will be preserved for future generations. Belarus is at a crossroads, and it is vital for the country to not repeat the past mistakes under a new slogan when choosing which direction to follow.
By Vera Haponava, archaeologist
*This project has been supported by the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES). The views and opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the FES.
