Forests and woodlands of the steppe region of Kazakhstan are an important element of the agrarian landscape of this region. The colonial agrarian policy of the Russian Empire in Kazakhstan was carried out not only through the mass resettlement of peasants and the seizure of fertile land, but also the seizure of forests and forest lands of Kazakh lands. According to the Steppe Regulations of 1891, forests and forest lands in the Kazakh steppe were declared the state property of the Russian Empire. In the process of implementing the agrarian colonial policy, the forest lands of the steppe regions became objects of commercial production. These factors became a prerequisite for a change in the agrarian landscape and a crisis in the ecosystem of the steppe regions in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries