Conservation in the USSR?

[DasFapital]

How big where the Soviets on conservation/environmentalism? I remember reading a few things about them setting up preservation areas in Central Asia but overall its something I've never heard or seen much about.

[piet11111]

That is actually a really interesting question that i unfortunately can not answer but would want to learn more about.

[Ostrinski]

The Soviet Union had little to no regard for the environment in the planning of production. All was subjugated to industrialization and the maintenance of the economy.

[bad ideas actualised by alcohol]

Very little. This was not uncommon in these times though, I doubt it has gotten that much better since then either.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

Generally they had a very poor record on enviromentalism. For example, as a part of their agricultural project they drained the Aral Sea down to 60 percent of it's original size to provide water for the farms. Here's a picture

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSGN42uHJOPYKUIPYIH1ZjRBahDiZQYR 7HPXf4GA4tK9O1oP8ZGYg

And this only shows it starting from 1977, during the fifites it was the fourth largest lake in the world.

But Cuba is much more interesting. Originally Castro didn't hold the enviroment in much regard, declaring that the country had “to complete the task of conquering rivers, complete the task of conquering floods, conquer nature. Unless we conquer nature, nature will conquer us.” He tried to launch something akin to the great leap forward, where he attempted to increase irrigation 1000% over the country. Needless to say it failed catastrophically. However despite his disregard for the environment he is very concerned about climate control and his country was the first to be declared environmentally sustainable in the world.