RESPONSIBILITY FOR CRIMES RELATED TO PLANT PROTECTION

Аннотация

This article examines the legal responsibility for crimes related to plant protection, focusing on the prevention, detection, and punishment of violations in this area. The study highlights the importance of safeguarding plant life from harmful organisms, misuse of pesticides, and illegal activities that endanger biodiversity and agricultural sustainability. The article also reviews national and international legal frameworks, emphasizing the need for stricterenforcement and awareness to ensure foodsecurity and ecological balance. Key words: Plant protection, legal responsibility, environmental crime, agricultural law, biodiversity, criminal liability, phytosanitary control, ecological safety. The issues of protection and rational use of the plant world are one of the most pressing environmental problems at the global and national levels. Factors such as the decline of biological diversity globally, changes in the atmosphere, the reduction of forest areas, and the disruptionofecological stabilityrequire areview oftherelationship between humans andnature. The Republic of Uzbekistan, as a country rich in natural resources, is distinguished by the diversity and richness of its flora. However, in recent years, there has been an increase in cases of illegal felling, the destruction of rare and protected plant species, non-compliance with agrotechnical procedures, and the illegal use of forest fund lands. This, in turn, has a negative impact onthenatural environment and limits thepossibility ofrestoring theplant world. The fact that 70 percent of the Earth's surface is covered with plants also indicates that these natural objects occupyaspecial place in theecological system1. The total area of cultivated crops is 1.5 billion hectares, which is about 1/10 of the total area. It should be noted that there are 300 thousand species of flowering plants on Earth. 21,000 species arefound in theCIS countries, 7,000in Central Asia, and over4,000in Uzbekistan2. The President's initiative to declare 2025 the "Year of Environmental Protection and Green Economy" is an important initiative put forward to protect nature in the interests of not only today's generation, but also future generations. This proposal, voiced bythe head ofourstate, has become an important step in maintaining the balance between man and nature, the rational use of natural resources, andensuring sustainable development. Also, the introduction of Article 49 in the new version of the Constitution of the Republic of Uzbekistan, adopted in 2023, is one of the important innovations. This article enshrined the 1Қаранг:Бобожонов Б.Э., "Экология ва атроф-муҳитни муҳофаза қилиш асослари", Т.: «Fan va texnologiya», 2020,45-б 2https://yuz.uz/news/ozbekiston-qizil-kitobiga https://ijmri.de/index.php/jmsi volume 4,issue5,2025 1325 followingnorm forthefirst time: "Everyone has theright to a favorableenvironment andreliable information about itscondition." This norm is aimed at constitutionally guaranteeing human environmental rights and is of particular importance in protecting the fundamental interests of citizens related to the natural environment. The reflection of such legal guarantees at the constitutional level demonstrates Uzbekistan's focus on important reforms in environmental protection, ensuring environmental safety, and strengthening publicparticipation in environmental matters. Today, the issue of maintaining ecological stability, rational use of natural resources, in particular, the protection of objects of the plant world, has become one of the most important tasks on the agenda of the world community. Because preserving biological diversity, ensuring ecological stability, and creating a favorable natural environment for human health are becoming oneofthemain directions of statepolicy. As President Shavkat Mirziyoyev noted, "We will dedicate the year to this direction, analyze the laws, and formulate the work." It would be good if we took every decision, every decree under theguise ofgreening."3 In particular, the environmental policy reflected in the "Development Strategy of New Uzbekistan for 2022-2026," adopted by the Decree of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan dated January 28, 2022 No. UP-604, is aimed at implementing the transition from the protection of individual elements of nature to the general protection of ecological systems, ensuring optimal indicators of the human environment and harmonizing interconnected sectors of the economy with mechanisms for their development based on the principles of a "green economy." The 80th goal of this strategy is aimed at environmental protection and improving the ecological situation in cities and districts. Furthermore, the task of expanding the area of forests has been defined inGoal 81,which further strengthens therelevance ofthistopic. At the same time, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the recently adopted Presidential Decree "On Approving the Concept for Raising the Environmental Cu