Greek timber industries and wood product markets over the last century: development constraints and future directions

Abstract

This paper examines the Greek forestry sector after 1930. According to the past literature, the sector was entirely degraded and reliable data are not available. The study analyses critical historical data about timber sector and timber companies; the main objective is the specification of the factors that kept the Greek forest sector underdevelopment. The factors and the development constraints, including the indigenous characteristics of the Greek forests, the inhibitory policy for timber production investments, especially in the state industries, lack of market research, unorthodox procedures for sale of the wood, bad quality and high cost of production and periods of general economic recession are analyzed farther. Conclusively, the need for producing official forest maps, forest data recording, rapid adaptation to EU specifications, investments, deep changes in to the managership of the state industries, permanent and specialized personnel and promotion of national programs for the development of the small-scale wood elaboration and wood selling industrial units are some of the solutions for the above problems that could be suggested.