The Polish landscape changing due to forest policy and forest management

doi:10.3832/ifor0503-002

This paper presents an analysis of policy application in Poland affecting landscape and forest management changes designed for an ecological restoration. “Ecological” policy was introduced in Poland in 1991 (Bill on Forests) and 1995-1999 (Decree 11 and 11A). To analyse the effectiveness of the policy and its impact on landscape change, the study uses five selected indicators: 1) species distribution, 2) methods of final felling, 3) forest functions in terms of protection and economic role, 4) cost structure and 5) wood production. The analysis shows that some of the ecological ideas were applied years before official documents were issued: species composition change, in favour of broadleaves has been carried out since 1945; since 1975, considerable growth in protective areas has been observed, doubling from 22.5 to 47.5% by 2006; timber resources have also grown by 50% in the last 35 years. After 1991, when the new policy was introduced, change in these indicators was more rapid. More direct and visible examples of policy applications in the last 15 years are observed in 1) the reduction of clearcuts: in 2005 this was at its lowest level in comparison with the previous 15 years and amounted to 19.9%; 2) the focus on protection: the cost of forest and fire protection in 2006 was the third largest expense in the State Forests budget, special attention was paid to reconstruction in order to increase water retention, 3) the afforestation process: this has doubled in intensity in the last decade compared with the previous decade. Nevertheless, organised landscape change is also accompanied by natural calamities, of which fires and windbreaks are most severe.

Keywords

Landscape change, Forest policy, Ecological restoration

Authors’ address

(1)

Department of Forest Utilisation, Poznan University of Life Sciences, ul. Wojska Polskiego 71A, 60-625 Poznan (Poland)

(2)

Forest District Czarnobór, The State Forests, Czarnobór 1, 78-400 Szczecinek (Poland)

Corresponding author

PS Mederski
piotr.mederski@up.poznan.pl

Citation

Mederski PS, Jakubowski M, Karaszewski Z (2009). The Polish landscape changing due to forest policy and forest management. iForest 2: 140-142. - doi: 10.3832/ifor0503-002

Academic Editor

Marco Borghetti

Paper history

Received: Apr 08, 2009
Accepted: Apr 09, 2009

First online: Jul 30, 2009
Publication Date: Jul 30, 2009
Publication Time: 3.73 months

Open Access

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

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