The first mentioning of Puzla, a village located on the left bank of the river Vychegda, dates back to 1888. The Klirovye sheets issued in 1896 contain the following information about the 5th estate of the Ust-Sysolsk region: «Puzla – Ulyashovskaya. A number of households – 2, male population – 8, female population – 10. Nationality – Zyryans of peasant class». The village got its name from the nearby flowing river, which name comes from the word “puzla”, meaning “drift, layer of silt, sand, slime, brought by the streaming water; unstable sandy river bottom”.

Natives of the village Voldino three brothers Petr, Terenty, and Fillip Ulyashov and Prokopy Ulyashov were the first settlers of these places. They had to build a village on the Troitsko-Pechorsk route. The men have been looking for a place for a long time and finally decided to settle down in two kilometers from the point where the river Puzla flows into the Vychegda. Though the village was located off the route the people never passed it without dropping in: the rumours about the hospitality of the people inhabiting these places have spread quite rapidly.

During the Civil War a remote Puzla didn’t remain aloof from the ongoing events: soldiers of the partisan unit from the settlement Kerchomya Darya Kochanova and Gavriil Timushev were gunned down by the White Guards beside the village.

В 1930 году в деревне был образован колхоз «Заря». Колхозники сеяли рожь, ячмень, овёс, горох, турнепс, капусту, заготавливали сено, силос, лес, держали скот: лошадей, коров, овец, свиней.

В суровые сороковые 20 воинов из маленькой Пузлы погибли на фронтах Великой Отечественной, навсегда остались лежать в земле. А на сегодняшний день в живых не осталось уже ни одного из вернувшихся домой с победой участников войны.

В 1957 году рядом с деревней появился поселок Пузла, в котором был открыт лесопункт Помоздинского леспромхоза. А через десять лет местный колхоз реорганизовали в подсобное хозяйство леспромхоза. В августе 1976 года деревня была объединена с посёлком, и сейчас деревня и поселок – единое целое.

Хотя в окрестностях Пузлы обнаружены месторождения бокситов, каолиновой глины, доломита, песчано-гравийных смесей, газа, воды, уже на протяжении многих десятилетий основным ресурсом, благодаря которому живёт деревня, является лес.

В 1984 году на основе исследований учёных был создан Пузлинский ботанический памятник природы, на территории которого встречаются 24 вида редких растений, в том числе башмачок настоящий и пятнистый, адонис сибирский, сон-трава, осока белая, козелец Рупрехта…

По последней переписи 2010 года в Пузле проживает 334 человека. Сегодня здесь есть начальная школа, детский сад, пекарня, отделение почты, АТС, фельдшерско-акушерский пункт, клуб. Здесь располагаются участковое лесничество и пост гидрологической станции. Работают магазины индивидуальных предпринимателей Уляшева Р.В. и Цулаия В.А. Но градообразующим предприятием, на котором трудится большая часть жителей Пузлы, а также и некоторых других сёл и деревень Усть-Куломского района, является ООО «Комилесбизнес».

«Само географическое расположение Пузлы – в глубокой тайге, на границе Усть-Куломского и Ухтинского районов, где в радиусе 50 км нет ни одного населенного пункта и никакого другого предприятия – обусловили тесную взаимосвязь деревни и бизнеса», – считает директор ООО «Комилесбизнес» Александр Игнатов.

Однако таких отдалённых деревень в республике много, а вот подобного устойчивого, социально ориентированного местного производства в нашей сельской глубинке найти трудно.

Нет возможностей для развития современного лесного бизнеса в удаленных лесных районах? Не было их и в Пузле. В середине 90-х она, как и многие другие лесные поселки, была неофициально отнесена к бесперспективным и вымирающим. Это вызвало отток трудоспособного населения, снижение рождаемости, что в свою очередь привело к закрытию социальных учреждений.

In 1930 a collective farm “Zarya” was established in the village. Collective farmers planted rye, barley, oat, pea, turnip, cabbage; they made hay and silage, harvested timber, raised cattle, such as horses, cows, sheep, pigs.

During the rough 40s 20 soldiers from a small Puzla died at the World War II fronts and stayed there forever buried in the ground. Speaking of the veterans having returned from war with victory, none of them have lived till the present day.

In 1957 a settlement Puzla appeared close to the village. A logging camp of Pomozdino logging enterprise was established there, and after 10 years a local collective farm was reorganized into a subsidiary husbandry of the logging enterprise. In August of 1976 the village was integrated with the settlement and now they are a single entity.

In spite of the fact that bauxite, kaolin clay, dolomite, sand and gravel mix, gas, water deposits have been discovered near Puzla, the main resource which has been ensuring the survival of the village for many decades is forest.

In 1984 based on the studies of the scientists a botanical sanctuary was created in Puzla. 24 rare plant species grow on its territory, among them yellow lady’s slipper, spotted lady’s slipper, Siberian Adonis, pasqueflower, white sedge, black salsify…

According to the last census carried out in 2010 the population of Puzla was 334 people. Today there is a school, kindergarten, bakery, post office, ATS, first-aid station, and club in the village. A district forest state unit and a hydrological station are located here. The shops of the private entrepreneurs R. Ulyashova and V. Tsulaia are functioning in the village. However, the core enterprise employing the major part of the Puzla resident, as well as residents of some other Ust-Kulom villages is LLC “Komilesbiznes”.

“It’s a geographic position of Puzla, deep taiga on the border between Ust-Kulom and Ukhta regions, without a single settlement or enterprise within a radius of 50 km from it, what has determined a close interaction between the village and business”, thinks Alexander Ignatov, Director of LLC “Komilesbiznes”

Though there are plenty of such remote villages in the republic, it is not easy to find such a sustainable socially-oriented local production in our rural back country.

There are no possibilities for development of modern forest business in the remote regions, aren’t there? Well, there were no any in Puzla as well. In the middle 90s it was informally referred to the unpromising and dying villages, which caused the drift of the employable population from Puzla and decline of birth, which in its turn resulted in closure of social institutions.

In 2004 LLC “Komilesbiznes” certified the entire supply chain from timber logging to finished products sales in accordance with FSC system. It was required to change and upgrade many aspects of the industrial process to comply with the stringent requirements of the voluntary forest certification according to the international standards, which became possible due to investments of the enterprise owners and loans provided by international banks. The enterprise managed to carry out modernization of the entire process flow from wood harvesting to production of export quality sawn wood. FSC-certificate enabled the company to sell the products – paper wood and sawn wood – both in the internal and external markets.

Director of the enterprise A. Ignatov is convinced that deep wood processing on site is economically feasible for further forest business development. This will require additional investments and skilled personnel. LLC “Komilesbiznes” is building a well-furnished accommodation for rotation workers and taking care of the enterprise and village social infrastructure improvement

According to the specialists of the Institute of Socio-Economic and Energy Problems of the North, Komi Science Center, Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who have been studying the resource potential and possibilities for development of the “forest villages”, “LLC Komilesbiznes” is a rare example of successful transformation of the soviet labour and production assets alongside with use of the local forest raw material base for the benefit of the village economic base development. The key factor having affected achievement of this result is the personality of the plant manager Alexander Ignatov, who has never separated business development from the development of the native village and who has bent every effort to involve maximum amount of villagers in the work at the plant.”

Participants of the Forest dialogue and other meetings and seminars, conducted within the framework of the “Forest village” project, got acquainted with LLC “Komilesbiznes” experience with great interest.

“Forest village” project participants from other rural settlements of the republic also took interest in one more Puzla experience – incipient germs of territorial public self-administration. Territorial public self-administration is foreseen by the Federal Law “On General Principles of organization of local self-governance in the Russian Federation” alongside with other forms of direct citizen participation in self-administration. This form of citizen participation in administration is also prescribed in the Charter of the rural settlement Voldino the village is included into.

Village Council takes an active part in consideration of such issues as land improvement. For example, trash bins have been installed around the village to collect the garbage, which is later on taken away to the disposal sites. For this reason the village is always clean. Besides, there is a “public” tractor (once it was bought out by the population) in Puzla, which is maintained and operated on the account of the villagers’ contributions. Consumption of the contributions is controlled by the Village Council: the money is mainly spent for the spare parts, petrol, as for the residual part of the villagers’ contributions, by decision of the Village Council it is spent for the school needs, and holding of celebrations. For instance, in 2008 village Puzla solemnly celebrated its 120th anniversary.

If village Voldino Council carries out a competition in its settlements (for example, to reveal the most well-managed courtyards) during the summary of the results municipal government in Puzla always asks advice of the Village Council.

The booklet is based on the information and photos provided by the Puzla villagers E. Ignatova, A. Ignatov and the Head of the Voldino Administration I. Andriyevskaya, as well as the materials and photos taken from the OJSC “Komilesbiznes” and Silver Taiga Foundation archives.