Factors influencing forest owners and manager's decision making about forestry services in logging-transport process

The aim of the paper is to present an overview of the forestry services market in Slovakia in terms of forestry services customers and to identify key factors determining existence and functioning of the market in the sphere of logging transport process. Methodically the paper is based on case studies elaborated on the basis of standardised interview carried out with selected forest owners and managers. As shown by the results, crucial factors influencing decision making about forestry services are machinery and technological equipment of forest enterprises, availability of financial resources, amount of performed work, production and transaction costs and legal constrains resulting from the Act on Public Procurement. The results of the questioning and case studies allowed defining basic economic assumptions of the forestry services market functioning under the current conditions in Slovak forestry.