OREANDA-NEWS. September 10, 2012. ITERA Oil and Gas Company has been the general sponsor of The Flight of Hope, a Project intended to salvage sterkhs, a nearly extinct species of white cranes, since 2005. The Company has reported the commencement of the Project’s key stage: young sterkhs’ independent flight behind a hang-glider. Those sterkhs were born in spring. Their development was monitored through cameras that ensured a real-time transmission of image (www.aif.ru/sterkh). Yesterday, the baby-sterkhs had finished their last trainings in the Yamal Peninsula. Today, they started the flight to their wintering site by following a hang-glider. Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, started the expedition by personally piloting the hang-glider.

Six cranes are accompanied by a group of ornithologists who sail Siberian Rivers in a special boat with equipment to monitor the sterkhs’ movement. The flight commenced in the Yamal Peninsula (the Kushevat Region) to cross the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District, the Khanty-Mansijsk Autonomous District and to end in the Belozerski Reserve in the Tyumen Region in the middle of October. The plan is to settle the birds in skeins of wild grey cranes and let them continue migrating southwards on their own.

On the threshold of the expedition which became a final stage of the Project to salvage sterkhs in 2012 and to attract a maximum possible attention to the Project, ITERA jointly with ornithologists from All-Russia Scientific Research Institute of Nature of the Ministry for Protection of the Environment and Natural Resources of the Russian Federation, The Oka Biospheric Reserve and partners (OJSC MTS, Comdi, D-Link) had started an online transmission of image from nests of sterkhs to an internet site of The Argumenty I Fakty (Arguments and Facts) Weekly Magazine www.aif.ru/sterkh this spring. About one million users from 75 countries all over the world have visited the site.

Igor Makarov, head of ITERA International Group of Companies, commented on the commencement of the expedition: "We have been supporting The Flight of Hope Project since 2005. Huge amount of work has been accomplished at the initiative of the Ministry for Protection of the Environment and Natural Resources of the Russian Federation and with the involvement of ITERA to establish the required infrastructure: open-air cages in the Oka Reserve have been modernized, five hang gliders, which make the core material base of The Flight of Hope Project, have been constructed, tested and adjusted for the Project’s needs. Unique birds, currently only twenty in the whole world, need continuous help and attention of people. We are absolutely happy that the Project has got assistance at the top level and was supported personally by the head of the state".

Sterkh is one of the most rear species of cranes. It nests in the Yamal Peninsula. Indigenous and small peoples of the Far North consider these cranes sacred birds. In recent years, the number of these birds approached the danger line of total disappearance, ITERA, being a socially focused company, for which Yamal is one of its main business regions, took a decision to help salvage sterkhs.

Flight of Hope is a Program developed by Russian scientists-ornithologists from All-Russia Scientific Research Institute of Nature. The Program is intended to salvage white cranes. Release to natural habitat of baby birds grown up in nursery occupies the central position in the Project. ITERA Oil and Gas Company has been general sponsor of the Program since 2005. Special extra-light flying machines, motor-hang-gliders, had been constructed to teach baby-cranes the desired parameters of the migration flight. In result of special training, baby-cranes grown up in nursery, perceive a motor-hang-glider as the leader of flight and follow it to their wintering site. During the migration they make stop-overs for rest at pre-selected suitable places.

ITERA International Group of Companies was established in 1992. It is a vertically integrated holding company which includes dozens of enterprises and companies in CIS, Baltic countries, Western Europe, Asia and the USA. Gas business is a core business of ITERA since 1994. ITERA Oil and Gas Company, a Group company, has been developing its own production of gas in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District since 1998. It had invested over USD 2 billion into development of the gas industry. Since 2012, 51% of ITERA Oil and Gas, LLC, stockholding belongs to NK Rosneft. ITERA had invested over USD 2 billion into development of the gas industry. The total of over 250 billion cubic meters of natural gas has been produced in the fields developed by ITERA. The total of over 600 billion cubic meters of natural gas has been sold. Development, gas processing and power generations are also among strategic businesses of the Group.