In Slovenia over 300.000 private forest owners, own an area of 800.000 ha of forests. Forest holding is broken into small pieces. Interest for forest management is decreasing. Effective management with forests is difficult and the possible economic effects are not achieved. The purpose of the research was to find out how field foresters see and feel these problems. We also triedto find out if there are any differences in comprehension of these problems, regarding to the age, gender and region of the work. We wanted to find out what is the field foresters' opinion of private forest owners, how they cooperate with each other and how active they are in connecting private forest owners. We received 444 questionnaires, which represents 92.7 % response. The results show that field foresters have in average 2.9 contacts with private forest owners per day. The younger field foresters are more motivated and innovative their older colleagues. The highest grade of suitability for whole Slovenia was given to the machinery circle (2.51), while the second highest grade was given to the forest owners associations (2.46). Results acquired from the majority of field foresters are good fundation for forming strategic plans for more intense management of private forests.
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