REPRODUCTION OF THE MINERAL – RAW MATERIAL BASE PROBLEMS IN THE REPUBLIC SRPSKA

Abstract

The Strategy for the management and utilization of mineral resources of the Republic Srpska includes inevitably the mineral resource base as an essential element of material and social development, and it is one of the significant reliance forms on its own suorces in achieving economic development. In this sense, geological exploration, like an important activity in providing mineral resources for the development of the economy of the Republic Srpska, has not been given adequate attention since the 1990 and has not been systematically conducted at all.

The practice of the surrounding countries, and also in the earlier period, in these regions was such that geological exploration were treated adequately with the importance of mineral resources and, accordingly, funds were provided for their financing by the state and also by users of mineral resources. Today, there are no systematic geological surveys in the Republic Srpska and no systematic sources for their financing. The geological research activity in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the former Yugoslavia, throughout the earlier period, was characterized by relatively good organization and coherence of the research program. Due to this, many remarkable results have been achieved, which justify the realized investments in many ways.

The paper presents the basic characteristics of the mineral raw material base of the Republic Srpska, as then an analysis of inefficiency and stagnation in the research was done, and finally suggestions are given the necessary activities to improve the present situation.