Leś. Pr. Bad., 2008, Vol. 69 (4): 321–335 .

Stan lasów prywatnych w Polsce
The status of privately owned forests in Poland

Piotr Gołos
Instytut Badawczy Leśnictwa, Zakład Ekonomiki i Polityki Leśnej, Sękocin Las,
ul. Braci Leśnej 3, 05-090 Raszyn; Fax: +48 227200397, e-mail: p.golos@ibles.waw.pl

Abstract. The article presents selected economic aspects of privately owned forests and their management on the basis of findings of the questionnaire surveys conducted in 2004 by the Forest Research Institute (IBL). A nation-wide sample of 520 forest estates being part of agricultural farms were used in the research. The IBL’s findings were compared to similar, unpublished findings of questionnaire surveys conducted in 2002 by the Poznań Statistical Office in the Wielkopolskie Province and in 2004 in the Wielkopolskie, Podlaskie and Podkarpackie Provinces.
The purpose of the IBL’s and Poznań Statistical Office’s research was to investigate the possibilities of gathering information on privately owned forests on the basis of questionnaire surveys of a sample of forest estates. The IBL’s research enabled for the first time establishment, among other things, of the ways of managing the harvested timber raw material, the expenditure and income of the surveyed farms associated with forest management, or the area of land registered in the geodetic register as agricultural farms (fallow and waste land) overgrown with forests which appeared there from natural regeneration, as a result of nature’s forces.
Results of similar surveys to be conducted in the future on a random sample of forest owners may be extrapolated, at a defined tolerance, to the whole population of forest estates. Moreover, detailed research will enable not only the current appraisal of the condition of privately owned forests, but also the assessment of the anticipated directions in the development of this forest ownership category.

Key words: privately owned forests, questionnaire surveys, network of test farms.