Aleksandar Miljkovic

JP "Srbijašume"

The name of "Srbijašume", traditionally and symbolically, represents the bond between two great goods - the Republic of Serbia and its forests. Serbia's nature is rich and almost the third of its territory, around 2,5 million ha, is covered by deciduous and coniferous forest treasure. The care of Serbian forests dates back to the year of 1835 when it became constitutionally guaranteed. With the Act from 1861 the division of forests according to ownership type was defined for the first time, and the first Forest Law passed in 1891. SE for Forest Management "Srbijašume" was established in 1991 in the spirit of the genuine Serbian host, it looks after ca. 1 million ha of forests and parks in Serbia and performs professional work in private forests on an area of similar size. Today SE "Srbijašume" consists of 17 forest estates and 67 forest administrations, employing a workforce of 3,200 including 493 forest engineers and around 1,000 forest technicians who carry through the protection and enhancement of existing forests and the raising of new ones. The annual increment in forests managed by SE "Srbijašume" amounts to ca. 3 million cubic metres of timber volume, and only 1.1 million is exploited, which makes approximately the third of increment. Thus forest richness is increased, and through regular tending measures forest quality is enhanced. In 44 hunting grounds in the system of SE "Srbijašume" there are 9,500 big game animals and around 80,000 small game animals. The Republic of Serbia has entrusted SE "Srbijašume" with managing a part of Serbia's fishing waters and, freely said, its employees have been given the task to take care of a big part of this country's nature. To what extent Serbia will be an ecologically healthy environment, and how much healthy and high-quality food our state will be able to produce, primarily depends on our work and commitment.