In this year, we are marking the 180th anniversary of the Croatian Forestry Society and the 150th anniversary of Šumarski list.
In two issues of Novine hrvatsko-slavonsko-dalmatinske (today’s Narodne novine – Croatian Official Gazette), No. 99 of 12 December 1846 and No. 100 of 16 December 1846, an invitation was published to the foresters of Croatia and Slavonia of that time to attend the founding assembly of the Forestry Department of the Croatian-Slavonian Economic Society, which is considered the beginning of today’s Croatian Forestry Society. On St Stephen’s Day, 26 December 1846, foresters to whom we owe the Society’s long existence gathered at the episcopal estate of Prečec, a location between Dugo Selo and Ivanić Grad. Despite poor weather conditions and flooding, 17 foresters attended the founding assembly.
Thus began a 180-year journey of the third oldest forestry society in Europe, after the German and Swiss societies, which today has more than 2,800 members. During the Society’s existence, the states in which it operated changed (six states), as did their names (ten state names), while the Society itself changed its name 13 times.
Over 180 years of its activity, the Society was initially led by distinguished individuals who developed Croatian forestry and later founded the Croatian-Slavonian Forestry Society in 1876. They were succeeded by noblemen, forest owners, landowners, forestry officials at various levels of state administration, and sometimes also modest civil servants. Most often, the presidents of the Society were eminent university professors of the Faculty of Forestry as well as respected forestry professional. Today, the Society is headed by its 41st president, the distinguished scientist, Academician Igor Anić. In operational terms, the Society has been managed by secretaries, 44 of them to date, also professionals of very broad backgrounds, ranging from civil servants to prominent scientists. In this jubilee year, the Society is led by Secretary Oliver Vlainić, a respected forestry professional and former President of the Croatian Forestry Society for two terms.
From its very beginning, through its activities the Society sought to promote the advancement of forestry, and proposed to political decision-makers what it considered, at a given time, to be of best interest for forests and forestry. Its work included proposing legislative and subordinate regulations related to forestry, the establishment of educational, scientific and professional forestry and wood-technology institutions, the organisation of forest administration, and forest management interventions in both regular and exceptional circumstances. The Society has always included all ranks of forestry professionals as its members, from operational and scientific to managerial and supervisory sectors. Today, the Croatian Forestry Society is a professional and guild association of forestry experts, experts in hunting, wood processing and wood utilisation, biotechnology, as well as other professionals with at least secondary education who work in any of the aforementioned fields. The present and future times provide an opportunity for the Croatian Forestry Society to continue bringing together the forestry and wood-technology profession and science, and to use its voice and its actions to help in the adaptation to all challenges arising at the national and global levels.
This year, Šumarski list proudly celebrates its 150th anniversary of uninterrupted publication, which makes it the oldest Croatian scientific journal with continuous production and printing. On a global scale, it is among the ten oldest forestry journals and among older ecological journals. From its very first day of publication, dated 1 January 1877, Šumarski list has served as a chronicle of events in Croatian forestry and beyond. Thanks to a succession of outstanding editors, initially from operational forestry and later predominantly from the scientific community, a respected and recognisable journal has been created. Among the editors, special mention should be made of Prof. emeritus Branimir Prpić, who served as editor-in-chief of the journal for as many as 41 years. The statistics are impressive: over the 149 volumes published to date, 1,128 issues and 86,900 pages have been produced. It is also important to mention the journal’s fully digitised archive and its open access availability via Hrčak – the Portal of Croatian Scientific and Professional Journals, since 2006. This anniversary year, Šumarski list shall start with its transformation. After 32 years of recognisable green A4-format covers, the journal is receiving a new look with a white background. The new editorial team—Editor-in-Chief Prof. Marilena Idžojtić, PhD, and Technical and Layout Editor Branko Meštrić, BSc in Forestry—after six months of preparation during 2025, is presenting to the readers and the public a more modern appearance, not only of the cover but of the entire journal layout. At the end of last year, a new section dedicated to exceptional trees of our forests was established, and additional new sections are planned for the future. Of course, the forestry profession and scientific community are invited to contribute to the creation of new content for this proud Croatian forestry scientific, professional and guild journal.
We invite all members of the Croatian Forestry Society, as well as the forestry profession and scientific community, to mark these more than significant anniversaries with dignity through their activities in 2026.
Editorial Board
|
