The old democracies as well as the new democracies in Europe have developed comprehensive programs for subsidizing forestry. At the Europaforum Forstverwaltung 1995 the discussion of experts from nine European states with scientists has shown some strategies for the state forest service to influence the formulation of the programs as well as the implementation of subsidizing forestry. Based on the theory of administrative policy-making and the reports and discussion from the forest experts the following strategies can be formulated: 1. The goals for subsidizing forestry are defined in the laws. Due to the very general legal definitions of the goals the law gives general legitimization for the subsidies in forestry only. The real goal setting is done every year in the budgeting process which formulates only incremental changes in the distribution of the budget. With two strategies forestry can gain more political weight and higher budgets. Firstly, big damages in the forest by natural or environmental disasters cause pressure on the political stockholders for spending more money. By quickly offering detailed solutions forestry can gain these additional subsidies. Secondly, forests offer advantages to many groups in society. By explaining these long-term advantages to the specific groups gorestry can win their support in the fight for budget increases. 2. The increasing political weight of the ecological goals in the forest causes pressure on the concept of forest subsidizing. Traditional forestry following specific rules ("ordnungsgemaesse Forstwirtschaft") produces sufficient nonwood benefits. If the demand is growing, additional forest subsidies could be offered for specific non-wood benefits. Instead of this strategy the state forest enterprises prefer to continue the old principles of focusing on the wood production with positive external effects on the environment. As a consequence, forest enterprises have a weak position compared to the nature conservation authority in fighting for additional budgets for non-wood benefits of the forest. 3. Forest subsidies have the additional goal to support private ownership. In the old democracies the forest owners traditionally formulate their interests in a strong manner. Whereas in the young democracies forest owners must detect their new role again. Due to the extremely weak economic position of the new small forest owners they need heavy financial support from the state. Nevertheless, private forest owners will develop only if they find a position sufficiently independent from the state forest enterprise. 4. Financial resources from the European Union support the subsidies for forestry in the single member states. The member states take the money but they oppose a specific forest policy of the EU. In the future the legitimization of the financial support from the EU will be very difficult without such a common European concept. Consequently, some new member states try to establish common goals for forestry subsidies. A presupposition for the success of such an EU forest policy is the reorganization of the implementation process toward much simpler procedures. 5. During the last decades the state forest enterprises have developed increasingly complex bureaucratic implementation procedures for the forest subsidies which are highly inefficient. Improvement can be gained by a new strategy that focuses on the goals. The central institutions just formulate the goals and the field foresters resp. private forest owners can freely choose the most effective measures to meet these goals in their forests. This implementation will support the innovative power of the foresters in the field. Simultaneously, the central institutions will be forced to formulate detailed goals that give enough information for evaluating the success afterwards and to set priorities. 6. Subsidies are incentives for private owners to follow public goals. An other type of financial instrument also gives mon...
