Constituent assembly

In October 14, 2008 a historic event took place in Pavel Ershov’s suburban residence near Moscow. It was the constituent assembly of Russian Conifer society. How was it? It was Alexander Vereshchak’s idea. In the spring of 2008, he visited the Central Europe for the first time and took part in the meeting of the Czech conifer collectors and breeders which is traditionally held in Pruhonice (near Prague) on the first Saturday of March. Some of activists of Russian “circumconifer” community were there just earlier or later. All of us were amazed at the achievements of our European colleagues, the abundance and diversity of cultivars, and the scope of their work. By this time, the first collections of conifers and the first our grafts have appeared in Russia. So the idea to join forces found a support among professionals and amateurs.

So Alexander organized the October 14th event. There were only eight participants: from Moscow (Alexander Vereshchak, Pavel Ershov, Evgeny Tarasov, Elena Groshaven, Anatoly Gromadin, and Vladimir Zhitkov),  from St. Petersburg (Konstantin Korjavin) and from the Russian province (Sergey Goroshkevich, Tomsk). The question was so clear that there wasn’t any reason to debate: Russian Conifer society must be. Goroshkevich was elected as the president by a unanimous vote, Groshaven was elected as a secretary. They were asked to develop a concept of the Society. The interaction on official website of the Society has been defined as the main form of work. 

The newly elected president outlined the aims and objectives of the society and delineated the ways of their implementation. Talking about a small number of participants of the constituent assembly, he drew a historical analogy. At the 1st The Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) Congress, held in 1898, there were only 9 people - just one more participant. Nevertheless, from this spark kindled a very big and serious fire. He wished the society the same great achievements of course not in destruction, but in creation.