At the beginning of this short and selective description of the evolution of state forestry since the 1990s it should be noted that there have been different readings/writings of the formal and informal history of state forestry policies and economy after 19896. This points to ongoing struggles over the role of the state in the forestry economy7 and the level of commodification or decommodification of nature. A new model of administration of state forests was established in 1992, which has been based on the outsourcing of planting and woodcutting services. The machinery and other production facilities of the state forestry companies were mostly privatised and the Forests of the Czech Republic contracted the newly formed private companies. As mentioned already the state maintained its ownership of the forests8. The new system provided economic stability without having to demand state subsidies for state forestry and a gradual and “socially sensitive” decrease in the number of employees in forestry9.
1990
1993
1996
1999
2002
2005
2007
2010
57 700
44 758
41 549
33 314
25 702
21 835
19 398
15 150
57 700
10 019
9 195
7 664
6 290
5 830
5 783
5 130
private
*
33 815
29 414
22 860
16 984
13 614
11 320
8 015
communal
*
924
2 940
2 790
2 428
2 391
2 295
2 005
Total forestry sector
state of which
Table 1. Development of employment in forestry in the Czech Republic from 1990 to 2010 (selected years) * Data unavailable. Source: Czech Statistical Office in Reports on Forestry in the Czech Republic (http://www.uhul.cz/zelenazprava/) 6
In the 2011 “Concept of the Ministry of Agriculture on the Economic Policy of the Forests of the Czech Republic of the Czech Republic from the Year 2012” there is for example an important part devoted to the history of the transition of state forestry after 1989. The transition of the state forestry transition in the 1990s was described as a rather formal, rational and democratic process. Its informality was largely omitted (see Böröcz 2000). For example, most of the main persons involved in the preparation of the privatisation of state forestry property knew each other from university studies of forestry where they also played together in a music band (Bláha 2010). As for the 2000s some conflicted parts were omitted such as the important 2004 decision of the Supreme Audit Office of the Czech Republic, which criticised lack of oversight and control in the Forests of the Czech Republic and the methods of selling wood that have caused major losses for the state. 7 For example a danger of “nationalisation” has been invoked by fractions of the capital on a multiple occasions when the profits from wood sales were to be restructured among the companies and/or between the companies and the state. 8 This is true at least for the parts that were not given back to their former owners in the process of property restitution. 9 Evaluation of some of the positive sides of restructuring of state forestry by Jaroslav Palas, Social Democratic Minister for Agriculture in 2003 (Palas 2003).
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