Economic Integration of Urban Consumers’ Demand and Forestry Production in Bulgaria

The objective of the paper is to contribute to a better understanding of the problems of economic integration of urban consumers’ demand and rural forestry production and possible solutions of forest-based entrepreneurship in small-scale forestry, wood processing and non-wood forest products and services in Bulgaria. The paper presents some results of the work undertaken in the frame of the first phase of the European project COST Action E30 “Economic integration of urban consumers’ demand and rural forestry production”. The presented five topics concern consumption of forest related products and services, small-scale forestry practices as a factor affecting consumption and living standards in the country, wood-processing industries, non-wood forest products and services, as well as forests resources and their ownership structure as factors, affecting forestry production. It has been assumed the economic integration of urban internal and external consumers’ demand and forestry production in Bulgaria has to be developed. It is concluded that Bulgaria has significant resources and potential for further forestry production, which are not used effectively. The identified main barriers to entrepreneurship in the forestry, wood processing and non-wood products and services in Bulgaria are the low level of production and demand for forest – wood product services, and respective national policy. The lack of consensus for enterprise development in the forestry in Bulgaria defines a broad area of questions to be answered. Among them are which model for innovation system in forestry to be chosen? Which is the effective strategy for further integration to EU forestry structures, what kind of effective marketing strategies for Bulgarian products to develop in order to increase foreign consumers’demand? What kind of instruments to be introduced in order to increase sources for purchasing modern forest machinery, building forest roads and forestation? What kind of incentives to be implemented to improve the quality of local production and to protect industrial property rights? How to speed processes of standardization and certification?