FORESTS AND FOREST CONTRACTORS IN POLAND

JODLOWSKI Krzysztof

INTRODUCTION

Poland's forests today cover 8.7 million hectares (equivalent to 28% of the country's total surface area). In the period 1946–93, forest cover increased by 7%, mainly due to very intensive afforestation of barren and low-profit agricultural land, but per capita forest area is declining and currently stands at 0.23 hectares. Wood density is still short of the optimal level established for Poland (30–34%), and lower than comparative figures for Europe (32%) and the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (31%).

Public authorities own most of the country's forests (83%), 82.1% of which are the property of the Treasury; 78.4% are managed by the State Forest Directorate, 2% by the national parks authority and 1.7% by other bodies. Gnimas (units of local government administration) own 0.9% of the forest area and private forests account for 17% of the total (of which 15.9% is owned by individuals, although their participation in the central and eastern parts of the country is much higher at 30–60%). State Forest Directorate holdings number 28,000 complexes, of which no more than 6,000 cover no more than 5 hectares. The total number of private forest holdings owned by individuals stands at 900,000, and the average size does not exceed one hectare. In addition, many private holdings may often be made up of several separate plots.

As a result of extensive deforestation in past centuries and very widespread post-war reafforestation, Poland's forests are highly fragmented and isolated. Today, 78% of the forest area is covered by coniferous stands, dominated by Scots pine (68%). Among the remaining 22% of deciduous stands, oak, ash, maple and elm account for 6%, birch 6%, alder 5%, beech 4% and other species less than 1%.

Poland's forests exhibit an imbalance in age structure: Young stands (up to 60 years) cover 65% of the total forest area, and the average age of stands in state forests is 55 years and in private forests 36 years. The current average standing volume totals 186 m³/hectare (201 m³/hectare in state forests and 118 m³/hectare in private forests). The total (over-bark) volume is estimated at 56 million m³.

STEPS TOWARDS SUSTAINABLE FOREST MANAGEMENT

Legal framework

The following legislative acts and directives refer to forests and forest-related activities in Poland:

• Forest Act (1991): the act recognises three equally significant forest functions - productive, ecological and social. In an amendment to the Forest Act (1997), it was recognised that the objective of forest management should be the entire forest ecosystem, not only forest stands. Forest management plans now contain a section on nature conservation.
• Protection of Nature Act (1991): the act regulates forest management in forests that constitute nature reserves or are part of national parks.
• Forest Promotion Areas Directive (1994): through the directive, the State Forest Directorate created seven forest promotion areas, since then the number has risen to ten, covering a total area of 445,670 hectares (6.5% of total forest cover). Forest promotion areas are functional areas of ecological, educational and social importance, whose management is regulated by a consistent economic and protection programme drawn up by the respective regional State Forest Directorates. In each individual forest promotion area, a director-general presides over a scientific-social council responsible for projects and their implementation in these areas.
• Protection of Arable and Forest Land Act (1995): under the act, the protection of forest areas calls for:
  • restricting the designation of forest areas for non-forestry purposes;
  • preventing the degradation and devastation of forest areas, damage to forest stands and deterioration of forest production as a result of activities unrelated to forest management;
  • restoring the economic value of land deprived of forest features as a result of activities unrelated to forest management;
  • enhancing the economic value of forest areas and preventing a fall in their productivity. Designation for non-forest purposes: forest land owned by the Treasury requires the permission of the Minister of the Environment, Natural Resources and Forestry; other forest land requires the permission of the voivode (head of the administrative division).
• Directive N^o 11 (1995) issued by the State Forest Directorate-General: under the directive forest management is based on ecological principles. Following its issue, each forest inspectorate is preparing a nature protection plan.
• Protection of the Environment Act (1980), updated most recently in 1997: the act determines principles of protection and rational control of the environment, and preservation of the quality of the environment, in order to provide today's and future generations with favourable living conditions and the right to use environmental resources. Under the act, organisations and individuals using land are obliged to protect soil from erosion, mechanical devastation and pollution from toxic substances. If activities are related to agriculture or forestry, they are obliged to use correct methods of cultivation.

Forest certification

The process of forest certification started towards the end of 1995 and the beginning of 1996, when a group of British wood product traders submitted an offer to certify the costs of firms submitting an application to operate in Poland's forests. Certification has been completed in four regional State Forest Directorates: Gdansk, Katowice, Krakow and Szczecinek. The total area of certified forests is 1589.3 thousand hectares, with assessments carried out by the Oxford-based SGS Forestry Organization under its QUALIFOR tool-testing programme.

Table 1: Certified forest areas in Poland

* Average annual wood harvesting can be assumed to remain at this level

Influence of forest certification on the wood market

• Domestic market: no demand for certified wood or wood products.
• International market: an increase in demand has been observed only in the Regional Directorate of Gdansk, mainly from Western European customers. According to regional directorate representatives, the export of certified wood and wood products is rather limited.

ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE OF STATE FORESTS

State forest holdings are organised at three levels:

State Forest Directorate-General
17 Regional State Forest Directorates
438 Forest Inspectorates

Activities of state forest holdings are regulated by the Forest Act of 1991. The State Forest Directorate-General is responsible for forest policy and forest conditions, through the national and regional directorates as executive bodies. Regional state forest directors nominate the heads of their respective forest inspectorates, each of whom is responsible for autonomous forest management policies (approved by the Ministry of the Environment, Natural Resources and Forestry), forest conditions and decisions concerning cuttings, wood sales, investments and purchase of equipment. The forest inspectorate heads can also influence decisions concerning contractors. Wood prices are coordinated by State Forest Regional Directorates.

WOOD HARVESTING (IN STATE FOREST HOLDINGS)

The annual cut has recently run close to the permitted cutting level. In 1997, total harvesting amounted to 19.9 million m³ of roundwood (under bark), of which softwood accounted for 14.7 million m³ and hardwood 5.2 million m³. Final fellings account for 7.7 million m³ and intermediate fellings 12.2 m³. In intermediate fellings, 0.2 million m³ of wood is from cleanings and 3.3 million m³ from sanitary felling. The most popular wood harvesting method is the tree-length method (56% of total volume), followed by the whole-stem method (21%), cut-to-length method (18%), whole-tree method (3%) and chip harvesting (2%).

Manual and mechanised-manual operations dominate in wood harvesting. The level of mechanisation varies from type to type of wood harvesting methods as follows:

Trends in forest operations

1. A continuous increase in the share of the cut-to-length method and number of forwarding and multi-function machines due to lower costs and less forest damage.
2. Installation of cable systems in mountainous regions.
3. Burning of log residuals in clear cuttings replaced by chopping or crushing.
4. A tendency towards the market economy in thinning, where tending operations are carried out only if there is a demand for wood, especially in early thinnings.
5. Over-supply of workforce is a limiting factor in the development of highly-mechanised forest operations.

THE ROLE OF PRIVATE ENTERPRISES IN POLAND'S FORESTRY ACTIVITIES

The transformation process started in 1990, with a few private enterprises being given the responsibility for executing most forestry work in a number of forest inspectorates. The most recent situation is illustrated in the following tables:

Table 1: Level of privatisation in state forests (1995-96)

Table 2: Private enterprises (1996)

* Total number of employed workers: 6,064 regular and 10,071 seasonal

Table 3: Structure of service offered for the benefit of state forests

According to the owners of private enterprises, the main barriers to development they face are the following:

• low rates offered by forest inspectorates;
• excessively short-term contracts;
• need to participate in bidding;
• lack of interest by forest inspectorates in enterprise development;
• bad cooperation with forest services;
• bad attitude of forest inspectorates towards private enterprises; and
• delays in clearing.

A certification system for assessing contractors is being developed, with the objective of selecting and promoting firms that can offer permanent and high quality services. It is envisaged that representatives of state forest holdings, the association of private forest contractors and applicants will be involved.

CONCLUSIONS

• The current level of mechanisation of wood harvesting operations is relatively low — the chainsaw is the basic tool in felling and limbing, and horses and farm tractors are the basic means of extraction.

• Contractor firms are small (2–5 persons) and not usually well-equipped.

• There should be an increase in the share of the cut-to-length method and the number of forwarding means (purpose-built forwarders and farm tractors with forest trailers), which are much less harmful to forests than other means used for ground extraction.

• The promotion of planting medicinal plants after thinnings is an environmentally-friendly alternative and offers an opportunity for the regular tending of young stands.