Kosice, Earth Slovakia This year´s long winter has brought probably the largest number of timber thieves to the forests of eastern and central Slovakia over the past years, forest managers have told journalists, adding that the damage has climbed up to millions of crowns. Trees have been illegally cut and exploited not only by individuals from remote Romany settlements, but more and more often also by whole organised gangs and even skilled "entrepreneurs."
The demand for timber remains high in Slovakia. With rising prices of energy and gas, more and more people prefer heating their homes with cheaper solid fuel.
"If they do not want to freeze to death, they must go to the forest [to fetch some wood]," says Jan Liska, head of the state Forest Management company´s branch in Presov, east Slovakia.
Last winter, the damage timber thieves caused to forests in Slovak Paradise, a renowned tourist destination, reached 325,000 crowns, while this winter´s hitherto largest illegal tree cutting, uncovered in the Prielom Hornadu protected nature area on January 11, alone caused damage of 3 million crowns.
Liska said in his opinion the tougher punishments for timber thefts, introduced as of January, solve nothing. As a solution he proposed that Romanies be enabled to work off the price of the timber they get.
"Even if we caught someone stealing timber and fine him, he usually does not have money to pay the fine. If we caught them for the second and third time, they could be sent to prison, but the prisons would quickly get overpacked this way," Liska said.
http://www.romea.cz/english/index.php?id=servis/z_en_2006_0098