DIGITALNA ARHIVA ŠUMARSKOG LISTA
prilagođeno pretraživanje po punom tekstu



ŠUMARSKI LIST 5-6/2010 str. 4     <-- 4 -->        PDF

A WORD FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF


ON THE 114thELECTORAL MEETING OF THE CROATIAN FORESTRYASSOCIATION


In the past mandate period, the Croatian Forestry Association (hereinafter: CFA) has addressed a
variety of topics, ranging from the impact of forests on erosion and water protection, global climate
warming, environmental effects of the Multipurpose Danube-Sava canal, forests and the development
of tourism in the Republic of Croatia, the contribution of Croatian forestry and wood technology to the
EU, water as a factor of forest improvement and protection, forest certification – dead trees and biological
diversity, the relationship between forestry and the official Natura 2000 protection in Croatia,
organizational structuring of the company Hrvatske Šume, to the cooperation of forestry, water management
and meteorological service in celebrating Forest Day, World Water Day and World Meteorological
Day, and many others. In this double issue of the Forestry Journal we will discuss the 114th
electoral assembly of the CFA “The first national forest inventory in the Republic of Croatia”, by
which Croatia has been included into the exchange system of forest monitoring data that are compatible
and exchangeable at the international level. For the first time, data on the condition of forest resources
have been obtained by using a uniform method across the entire state territory.


Forest land, its use and conversion have been discussed by the Croatian Forestry Association on
several occasions. In his report on the activities of the CFA during the four-year mandate period,
Mr. Jurjević, M.Sc, president of the Croatian Forestry Association, reviews this issue, observing
that “we have expressed strong dissatisfaction with some solutions set down in the laws and sub-laws.
Namely, we can understand the intention to use bare forest land for the establishment of multiannual
plantations, but we cannot accept the regulation of the Forest Law which states that maquis can also
be used for this purpose. We should stress over and over again: maquis is forest. It is a fact that in the
areas in which the demand for forest land is the highest there are thousands, even hundreds of thousands
hectares of bare, abandoned agricultural land, the source of over 50 % of forest fires that permanently
threaten the surrounding forests”. It is according to a sub-law that the current
compensations for forests and forest land are “symbolic, rather than realistic. As a result, the size of
the area for the establishment of new forests does not even remotely approach the size of the area that
has been converted” (compensation of 1,000 kuna/ha as opposed to 30,000 to 100,000 kuna/ha, which
is the cost of establishing a new forest). Therefore, we wholeheartedly support the conclusion in the
report, which states that “forests and forestland should be redefined in the new categorization and
treated accordingly. In this way, cases in which agro-cultures, olive groves and vineyards are established
on absolute forest land, only because the owner has been defined, would be avoided”.


The acts and sub-acts mentioned above deserve a special discussion in one of the future double issues
of Forestry Journal. The forestry science and profession insists on participating in the creation of
both legal and sub-legal regulations; as a rule, these are passed administratively, but actually they
show their full potential only when applied in practice. Croatian forests are unique in Europe in terms
of naturalness, diversity and stability. For these reasons, they require special attention and highly responsible
treatment.


Professor Emeritus Branimir Prpić, Ph.D.