VOLUME 18, NUMBER 6 • FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 . z∏.12.50 (VAT 8% included) . ISSN 1233 7889 INDEX-RUCH-332-127 Since 1994 . Poland’s only business weekly in English

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Why is Poland’s unemployment rate sostubbornly high?

Two more airlines arereportedly interested inbuying Poland’s Lot

Euro 2012 could attract farfewer foreign fans thaninitially expected

News . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2-4

Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5-6

Finance & Economics . . . . . . . . . . .7

Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8-9

Opinion & Analysis . . . . . . . . .10-11

Cover Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12-13

Lokale Immobilia . . . . . . . . . . .15-17

The List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

Markets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20

Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21

Lifestyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22

Last Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23

REAL ESTATELokale Immobilia

• Hines in Kraków

• Malls in small cities

• W∏odarzewska plans

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An Oscar-nominated Polish-language film

has shined the spotlight on amovie industry still trying

to live up to its potential12-13

Syria’s troublePoland joined other countries in

condemning Russia and China’s veto

of a UN resolution on Syria 3

Backing downThe prime minister has suspended ACTA

ratification and called for public

“consultation” 4, 11

Interview:Ambassador

Sun YuxiChina’s ambassador to

Poland explains how to

strengthen Sino-Polish

trade 8-9

Interview:Ambassador

Sun Yuxi

In this issue

Lights, camera,Poland

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Czech R

epub

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Swed

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Luxem

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Franc

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German

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Greece

Polan

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Roman

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Bulga

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FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012NEWS2 www.wbj.pl

Wis∏awa

Szymborska

buried

Poland’s Nobel Prize-

winning poet Wis∏awa

Szymborska was laid to

rest last Thursday in

Kraków, where she spent

much of her life. The

secular ceremony at

Kraków’s Rakowicki

Cemetery was attended by

President Bronis∏aw

Komorowski and his wife,

as well as Prime Minister

Donald Tusk, cabinet

members and

representatives of the

diplomatic corps. Fellow

poets, including Julia

Hartwig and Adam

Zagajewski, also came to

bid farewell to Ms

Szymborska.

Poles leaning

to the left?

Poland is changing

politically, with more

citizens now declaring

leftist views, according to

a new European Social

Survey. On a scale from 0

to 10, where 0 indicates

extreme leftist views and

10 extreme rightist views,

the average score for

Poland is currently 5.63,

which compares to a

European average of 5.21,

reported Polska The

Times. In 2006, the

average score for Poland

was the most “right” in

Europe, at 5.77.

WWII bomb

found in

WarsawA 250-kilo unexploded

bomb dating from World

War II was found at a

building site of Warsaw’s

second subway line last

week. A section of

ul. Marsza∏kowska in

downtown Warsaw was

closed for several hours

and around 400 people

were evacuated from

nearby buildings as the

bomb was removed from

the site.

Interest rates

unchanged

Poland’s rate-setting

Monetary Policy Council

left the headline interest

rate unchanged for the

eighth month in a row at

its meeting last week. The

decision not to ease

monetary policy was made

because economic growth

and inflation were higher

than the central bank’s

targets. National Bank of

Poland head Marek Belka

said that interest-rate cuts

are unlikely in the near

future. ●

Ablon Group ..................................16

Air France-KLM ..............................5

Aster ..............................................12

Boryszew..........................................6

BRE Bank ......................................15

CBRE ..............................................16

China Minmetals..............................9

Concept Development ..................16

COVEC ..............................................8

Cushman & Wakefield ..................15

Enea..................................................5

Energa ..............................................5

EnergSys ..........................................6

Erbud ........................................15, 16

Fred ................................................23

Getin Holding ..................................6

Ghelamco Poland ..........................15

GTC ................................................16

Hines Polska ..................................15

Hog Wild ........................................23

Huta Stalowa Wola ..........................8

IMB Asymetria ..............................15

Ipopema Securities..........................5

Jones Lang LaSalle ......................17

KGHM ..............................................9

Kitchenaid ......................................23

Kraft Foods Polska ..........................5

LC Corp ..........................................16

LiuGong ............................................8

Lot Polish Airlines ..........................5

Lotos ................................................5

Lufthansa ........................................5

Multimedia Polska ........................12

Netia ..............................................12

Orlen ..............................................12

Peter Nielsen & Partners ..............6

PGB ..................................................6

PGE ............................................5, 12

PGNiG ..............................................5

PKN Orlen ........................................5

PKP Intercity ....................................5

Polkomtel ......................................12

Polstar Investment ........................16

PTC ................................................12

Ryanair ............................................5

Savills Polska ................................16

Sedlak & Sedlak ..............................7

Synthos ............................................6

Turkish Airlines................................5

UPC Polska ....................................12

Vantage Development ....................15

Vienna Capital Partners ................17

Warsaw

Stock Exchange..............6, 15, 16, 17

Wizz Air ............................................5

W∏odarzewska................................17

X-Trade Brokers Dom Maklerski ..20

Zak∏ad Ecoimpel ............................15

Greece will remain squarely inthe focus of investors andeconomists until at least Wed-nesday this week, when thecountry’s international credi-tors are due to decide whetherto proceed with negotiationsfor a second bailout thatwould prevent Greece fromdefaulting on its debts byMarch 20.

Last Friday, clashes brokeout in Athens as labor unionslaunched a nationwide striketo protest against the new aus-terity measures being demand-ed of their country, includingslashing the minimum wage inthe private sector by 22 per-cent, abolishing permanentjobs in state enterprises andcutting 150,000 jobs in thepublic sector by 2015.

Last Thursday, an agree-

ment was reached by politicalparties that support the cur-rent Greek caretaker govern-ment on more than €3 billionin additional cuts to the 2012budget.

But that same day euro-zone finance ministers addedextra demands, saying theleaders of the coalition had to,by this Wednesday, sign a writ-ten pledge to back the austeri-ty program and identify exact-ly from where €325 million ofthe €3 billion in cuts wouldcome before the €130 billionnew aid package would beapproved.

“In short, no disbursement[of aid] without implementa-tion,” said Jean-Claude Junck-er, the Luxembourg primeminister who serves as chair-man of the euro-zone finance

ministers’ meetings. On Friday, Georgios

Karatzaferis, the leader of theright-wing LAOS party, a coali-tion member, announced hewould not support the austerityprogram, thereby further fan-ning the flames of uncertainty.

Several other lawmakershave also signaled they willvote against the reforms, and itwas still not clear as of presstime if the government wouldmuster enough votes to pushthe reforms through.

Greece’s unemploymentrate soared in November to20.9 percent, compared with an18.2 percent rate just a monthearlier, and up sharply fromone year ago, ELSTAT, thegovernment statistics agency,reported last Thursday.

Remi Adekoya

70 million m3is the record amount of gas that could soon be

consumed per day in Poland if the recent freezingtemperatures persist.

z∏.25 billion was the value of the budget deficit in 2011, z∏.12 billionless than planned. The reduced deficit was a result ofhigher tax revenue and lower investment spending.

300,000was the number of mortgages worth more than the

homes themselves in Poland at the end of Q3 in 2011, a number three times higher than at the end of 2010.

z∏.3,584.50was the average Polish salary in Q4 2011. Wages

increased only 4.3 percent y/y, meaning theycontracted slightly in real terms.

“We will not ratify ACTA unless we are 100percent sure that the debate will be an openone, and based on open documents and on

transparency.”Prime Minister Donald Tusk makes an abrupt u-turn on the Anti-Counterfeit-ing Trade Agreement. He had previously indicated the treaty would be promptlyratified. Now, he promises to hold a thorough public debate.

Quote of the Week

Poland, a regional haven?Maciej Rapkiewicz, member of the board andexpert in the field of public finance at the Sobies-ki Institute think tank, argues that Polishfinances aren’t as great as some others argue.Log on to WBJ.pl to learn why.

On WBJ.pl

Numbers in the News

Company index

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14 SHOPPING CENTER BUSINESS FORUM

Event: Now in its 14th edition, this event is anopportunity to meet tenants and developersof commercial real estate. The organizer provides access to web-based businessappointments between participants.

Location: Hilton Warsaw Hotel

Web: scbf2012.retailnet.pl

16 PRCH MIXER Event: Exchange business experiences and con-

tacts with representatives of 190 companiesof the Polish Council of Shopping Centres(retailers, investors, developers, operators,industry consultants, etc.). Registration isrequired.

Location: Warsaw Web: prch.org.pl

February

DATELINE

Greece, againIN THE SPOTLIGHT

Figures in focusPoverty riskAt risk of poverty or social exclusion, % of total populationin 2010, selected EU countries

Source: Eurostat*Highest in EU27 **Lowest in EU27

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 NEWS www.wbj.pl 3

The Wzgórze shopping mall in Gdynia is already an established and recognized retail destination for the Tri-city metropolitan area’s inhabit-ants. Nearly 2.5 million people visit the center, which spans 21,000 square meters, every year. The revitalization project currently underway is therefore geared at turning the mall into a dominant shopping centre in the region, unleashing the full potential of its location.

Pedestrian boulevards link Wzgórze to the city center, a mere 300 meters away, as well as neighboring white-collar areas (25,000 sqm business park) and sports facilities (stadium and sports hall, 20,000 seats total.)

The center links main transit corridors (the Tri-City expressway linking Gdańsk, Gdynia and Sopot), with key public transportation nearby. The adjacent station of the regional SKM railway connects the entire region (38 million passengers a year, a train every 7 minutes).

Also in the area is a terminal hub of 8 trolleybus lines and 34 bus routes. In addition, 4 regular direct bus lines already serve the existing shopping destination.

With a total of 70,000 square meters of GLA once the expansion is complete, Wzgórze will offer a unique 3-in-1 shopping experience on the Baltic coast, where visitors can take care of daily shopping, seek out the latest urban fashion, or enjoy time at the many planned leisure-time facilities. Moreover, the expanded Wzgórze will provide Gdynia with one thing it has always been lacking – a “rynek” or main market. Most Polish cities have centuries-old market squares offering a place for inhabitants to meet and mingle. Gdynia, a modern city developed in the 1930’s mainly around the seaport, did not have this element planned.

Designers of the new and improved Wzgórze are counting on filling this void. Wzgórze will become the core of flow within the area, creating a new urban mixed-use destination for the city.

Work on the expansion and remodeling started in October 2011 and the first effects can already be seen – existing entryways have already been redesigned to fit the new architectural line.

Retailers are indeed jumping on the opportunity to find a place among the 270 available units. New space is already rented out to 70% of its capacity. The list of future tenants has become long and is rather impressive, with supermarket chain Real in its ranks, along with clothing chains Inditex (Zara, Massimo Dutti), Alshaya (The Body Shop, Mothercare), C&A and New Yorker. A Helios cinema will also open its doors at the new Wzgórze, as will an array of recognized convenience, home decoration and bookstore chains like Superpharm, Smyk, Empik, Sephora, Douglas, Drogeria Natura, Rossman, Tally Weijl and Duka, not to mention luxury item shops W.Kruk, Yes and Apart. Grupa LPP (Reserved , Cropp, House among other brands) just recently signed up for over 4,000 square meters of retail space.

The goal of the new Wzgórze is to become the number-one shopping and leisure destination on the Baltic coast. With the ambitious new design and visible interest by retailers and potential shoppers alike, the target should be easy to reach.

Key facts:Total GLA: 70,000 sqmTotal number of units: 270Main anchor tenants: Al Shaya Group, C&A, Helios, Inditex Group, New Yorker, Real, RTV Euro AGD

Advantages:Ideal location: 300 meters from the center of Gdynia. Facade along a main Tri-city express roadPotential consumer market: €3.5 billion (Gdańsk region)Unique concept: “3 in 1” – grocery shopping + urban style + recreation center

Wzgórze – shopping and leisure on the Baltic coast

Syria

Poland joins US, Europe in search for solution to Syria violenceAfter a UN resolutionwas vetoed by Russiaand China, the Westlooks for new meansto increase pressureon the Assad regime

Poland, through its embassy inDamascus, has agreed to serveas the United States’ protect-ing power in Syria, and willassist US citizens remaining inSyria by providing emergencyconsular services.

“Poland will spare no effortto ensure the representationand protection of US interestsin Syria, as was the casebetween 1991 and 2003 inIraq,” the Polish Foreign Min-istry said in a statement. TheUS embassy in Damascus sus-pended its operations onFebruary 6, and all US diplo-matic personnel have with-drawn from Syria.

“I thank our trusted Polishallies and friends for assumingthis important responsibility insupport of America and its cit-izens. On behalf of PresidentObama and Secretary Clinton,I thank President Komorows-ki, Prime Minister Tusk, For-eign Minister Sikorski, and thepeople of Poland for this act offriendship and solidarity,”American Ambassador toPoland Lee Feinstein said in astatement.

Meanwhile the US, the EUand their allies in the Arabworld are discussing whatsteps to take after China andRussia vetoed a UN SecurityCouncil resolution to back anArab League plan to resolveon the Syrian crisis on Febru-ary 4.

“We are continuing to workwith allies and partnersaround the world, particularlyin the Arab world and inEurope. Now that the UNSecurity Council action hasbeen blocked by the doubleveto we are compelled to workoutside the UN system,” USState Department spokesper-son Victoria Nulland told jour-nalists last Thursday. As WBJwent to press it was unclearwhat this cooperation mightentail.

An unnamed senior EUofficial told the AssociatedPress that the bloc wouldadopt further sanctionsagainst Syria at the EU foreignministers meeting scheduledon February 27.

Last Friday marked a weeksince Syrian forces had begunbombarding the city of Homs,Syria’s third-largest city andthe hub of the current upris-ing. New York-based NGOHuman Rights Watch said thaton-site observers confirmedSyrian forces were launchinglong-range indirect fire attacksinto densely populated areas,resulting in multiple civiliancasualties, while at the same

time preventing civilians fromaccessing food and medicaltreatment.

“It is clear the Syrian gov-ernment has interpreted theRussia-China veto as a carteblanche to launch an all-outassault on cities like Homswithout caring who’s killed inthe process,” Anna Neistat,associate emergencies direc-tor at Human Rights Watch,said in a statement lastThursday.

Polish Foreign MinisterRados∏aw Sikorski said on

Monday that Russia andChina would have furtherbloodshed in the country “ontheir conscience.”

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has beenaccused of cracking down vio-lently on anti-governmentprotests for over 10 months.Human rights officials fromthe United Nations estimatethat over 5,000 people havebeen killed since the beginningof the crisis in Syria in March2011.

Alice Trudelle

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Violence intensified in Syria after the February 4 vote at the UN Security Council

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012NEWS4 www.wbj.pl

The Polish governmentpublishes a list of“ACTA commitments”

In the wake of the Polish gov-ernment’s decision to freeze theratification of the Anti-Coun-terfeiting Trade Agreement(ACTA), Prime Minister Don-ald Tusk has attempted to makePoland’s approach to the dealmore transparent.

Mr Tusk held a question-and-answer session on ACTAlast Monday that was attendedby around 140 people, many ofwhom were members of thepublic. Others were able to askquestions via the Twitter andFacebook pages of the primeminister’s chancellery.

Poland’s PM started the ses-sion by again admitting the gov-ernment may have been too

hasty in signing the agreement,saying that a sufficient level ofanalysis had not been carriedout on ACTA. He added thatthis “was not done out of mal-ice.”

Many in Poland opposeACTA, saying it will threatenfreedom of speech, especiallyon the internet. Opposition hasled to a number of streetprotests and the hacking of gov-ernment websites.

Mr Tusk said he will doeverything he can to addressdoubts about the deal.

“We will not ratify ACTAunless we are 100 percent surethat the debate will be an openone, and based on open docu-ments and on transparency,”the PM said.

However, non-governmen-tal organizations including

Members of the ImprovisedFree Internet Congress, whichincludes the Helsinki Founda-tion, issued a statement prior tothe Q&A session saying theydid not believe the debatewould be carried out in condi-tions of transparency and open-ness.

One of the participants inthe debate said that if ACTAhad been in force in the 1960sand 70s, the internet wouldnever have come into existence.This comment was followed byapplause from the audience.

ACTA obligationsFollowing the Q&A session, thePolish government published alist of commitments that MrTusk said it needs to meetbefore the agreement can beratified.

One of the most importantof these is the publishing of doc-uments related to ACTA.

The Ministry of Administra-tion and Digitization said in astatement that it will publish“all of the documents regardingACTA which are in possessionof the Polish authorities … itwill [also] be looked intowhether it is possible to publishthe documents of the EuropeanCommission which are avail-able in Poland.”

The ministry also promised topublish a commentary in which itexplains how ACTA works, andhow the details of the agreementwould need to be applied so thatthey are compatible with the Pol-ish legal system.

“Once we look through thelegal system, we should thenhave a public discussion about

how to define from scratch theidea of ‘fair use’ of copyrightedwork, how to make sure thelaws are clear and that theyshow balance between the

necessities of punishing a crimeand guaranteeing freedom,”the ministry explained.

Izabela Depczyk, Gareth Price

Internet freedom

Poland commits to ‘openness’ over ACTA

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Prime Minister Tusk held a question-and-answer

session on ACTA last week

Homelessness

Deep freeze exposesPoland’s homeless problemThe country lacks acomprehensiveapproach for tacklinghomelessness, sayNGOs

As WBJ went to press, the Pol-ish police had reported 81deaths due to hypothermiasince January 27, when tem-peratures dropped to as low as-30 degrees Celsius. The deathtoll makes Poland among theworst-hit nations in a deepfreeze that has killed over 400people across Europe.

Police and NGOs believemost of the victims in Polandhave been homeless, oftenpeople under the influence ofalcohol. With this in mind,Prime Minister Donald Tuskhas asked local authorities totemporarily waive the ban onadmitting intoxicated peopleinto homeless shelters.

According to Julia Wyg-naƒska, a researcher at theEuropean Federation ofNational Organizations work-ing with the Homeless(FEANTSA), these deaths areproof that Poland’s system fordealing with homelessness isineffective.

“Currently support for thehomeless includes coveringbasic needs and implementingemergency measures duringthe winter. Looking at thenumber of people who havedied, this is not enough and itdoesn’t work.”

Zofia Popio∏ek, an MP fromthe Palikot’s Movement party,told Gazeta Wyborcza in Jan-uary that the z∏.5 million allo-cated in this year’s budget for

addressing homelessness waslaughable. But according toresearchers and NGOs, thegovernment’s entire strategy fortackling homelessness, gearedprincipally towards emergencyservices, is problematic.

“Of course shelters are thefirst thing needed in winter,and all hostels and communityhouses are currently full, butwe have to change the govern-ment policy, because the sys-tem is very passive,” said Dag-mara Szlandrowicz, represen-tative at the Barka Founda-tion, an NGO working withhomelessness in Poland, butalso with Poles sleeping roughin the UK, Ireland and theNetherlands.

“We don’t have a compre-hensive support system thatallows people to get out ofhomelessness, we lack preven-tion, and we lack cooperationbetween offices in the govern-

ment responsible for welfareand housing policy,” said MsWygnaƒska.

Researchers and NGOsagree that a major cause ofhomelessness in Poland is alack of affordable housing,which has become an even big-ger problem as a result of theeconomic crisis in Europe.

“People who run the shel-ters say more and more peopleare homeless. And the numberof people on the verge ofhomelessness, those who areable to pay their rent but can-not pay for anything else, isalso growing,” said Ms Wyg-naƒska.

There is no official esti-mate of the number of home-less people in Poland. TheEuropean Social watch report2010 put the figure at any-where between 30,000 to200,000.

Alice Trudelle

Why so cold?

According to the WorldMeteorological Organization(WMO), the sudden drop intemperatures observed allover Europe from late Jan-uary originates in EasternRussia and Siberia, with theSiberian high pressure sys-tem preventing milder tem-peratures from moving fromthe Atlantic eastwards overEurope.

This has caused very lowtemperatures in Eastern,Central and Western Europe,and heavy snow over South-ern Europe and North

Africa, as cold air from thenorth met with moist air fromthe Mediterranean.

Meanwhile, mild air hasmoved to the Arctic, causingunusually warm tempera-tures there and in NorthAmerica. The WMO callsthis a “negative Arctic Oscil-lation.”

According to the WMO,“the long duration of thecold period [in Europe], itsrelatively late onset and theextent of the cold area arenoteworthy but not excep-tional.” ●

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Involuntary manslaughter

Baby Magda’s autopsy completed

of Magda do not give reason tochange what the mother hasbeen charged with or to ques-tion any of her explanations atthis stage,” Marta Zawada-Dybek, a spokesperson for theKatowice prosecutor’s officetold a press conference.

Private investigatorunder scrutinyAt the same conference, MsZawada-Dybek said that theprivate investigator to whomKatarzyna W. confessed,Krzysztof Rutkowski, wouldalso be taken in for questioning.

Mr Rutkowski has beenheavily criticized by the policefor obstructing their own inves-tigations through his involve-ment of the media and his influ-encing of the mother to rejectthe help of police investigators.

At a press conference heldby Mr Rutkowski, babyMagda’s father, Bart∏omiejWaÊniewski, and his parentssaid they would defend the pri-vate investigator.

“When Mr Rutkowskicame, we became hopeful thathe would be able to help. Wenever [received that kind ofhelp] from the police,” babyMagda’s grandmother said.

Izabela Depczyk

The child’s mother has been charged with involuntarymanslaughter

The Katowice prosecutor’soffice has completed its autopsyof baby Magda and the bodyhas finally been released to thefamily. The baby’s mother,Katarzyna W., has been chargedwith involuntary manslaughter.In accordance with Polish law,her last name cannot berevealed.

Katarzyna W. first came intothe public eye on January 24when she told police that shehad been attacked by anunknown assailant and that herchild had subsequently beenabducted. However, she laterconfessed to a private investiga-tor that she had accidentallydropped the baby and buriedher outdoors.

Though she told the investi-gator that she had left babyMagda under a tree in the forest,search teams came up empty

handed. Later she changed herstory, admitting to police thatshe had left the body in the ruinsof an old railway building. It wasthere, during the evening ofFebruary 3, that police foundbaby Magda’s body.

Authorities said that thepreliminary autopsy was consis-tent with the mother’s versionof the story that she droppedthe baby and that it died fromserious head trauma.

“The results of the autopsy

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Magda’s body was found on February 3

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 INDUSTRY NEWS www.wbj.pl 5

Low-cost

airlines in

Modlin race

Irish budget airline

Ryanair has overtaken

rival Wizz Air in the battle

to be the first low-cost

airline to fly passengers

from Warsaw’s Modlin

airport. At a press

conference last week

company CEO Michael

O’Leary announced that

Ryanair’s first flight from

Modlin will take off on

July 16, a few days

earlier than the date

penciled in by Hungarian

Wizz Air. “Ryanair’s eight

new Warsaw Modlin

routes will deliver at

least 700,000 passengers

annually and sustain 700

local jobs,” said Mr

O’Leary.

Intercity

expects Euro

2012 profitsPolish rail operator PKP

Intercity is gearing up for

the Euro 2012

championship in June in

the expectation that the

tournament will provide a

major boost to both its

image and its bottom

line. “We want to take the

opportunity and improve

our image during Euro

2012, but we are also

hoping for profits,” PKP

Intercity CEO Janusz

Malinowski told Dziennik

Gazeta Prawna.

Energa and

Enea to

merge? Poland’s Treasury

Ministry is considering

merging electricity

companies Energa and

Enea after it failed to gain

regulatory approval for

PGE’s takeover of the

former company. “The

merger of Enea and

Energa is one of the

options [being

considered],” Deputy

Treasury Minister Pawe∏

Tamborski told reporters

last Thursday. He

admitted the move would

not be an easy solution,

since all shareholders in

Enea and Energa would

have to agree to the

merger, and the

transaction could again be

blocked by regulators. ●

State-owned PKNOrlen and PGNiG arethe most probablesuitors

Poland’s second-largest refin-er, Lotos, could end up beingbought by another large, state-owned energy firm, Treasury

Minister Miko∏aj Budzanows-ki suggested last week. So far,foreign firms have shown littleinterest in the government’s 53percent stake in the Gdaƒsk-based company.

“Lotos needs a strategicinvestor, but given the lack offoreign interest, we are leftwith a choice of companiesfrom the domestic fuel indus-try,” Mr Budzanowski toldPolish daily Puls Biznesu.

Only two domestic compa-nies would seem to fit the bill –Poland’s largest refiner, PKNOrlen, and gas monopolyPGNiG. Both are majoritystate-owned.

According to Konrad

Anuszkiewicz, an analyst atIpopema Securities, a tie-upwith Orlen would provide themost synergies. “However, thecompetition watchdog(UOKIK) would probably notallow it,” he said.

While PGNiG offers fewersynergies, such a mergerwould “definitely strengthenLotos’ balance sheet,” he said,adding that some investors areworried about Lotos’ highlevel of leverage. Lotos’ debtstands at z∏.6.9 billion, whilethe Treasury’s stake has beenvalued at around z∏.3 billion.

Treasury spokespersonMagdalena Kobos told WBJthat Lotos being bought by a

domestic investor was only onepossibility, and that “all scenar-ios will be considered and ana-lyzed,” as the Treasury contin-ues to reassess its strategy.

The government’s offer forLotos opened in October2010 and closed in December2011. Mr Anuszkiewicz chal-ked up the lack of interestamong foreign investors tothe government’s timing,since in the first half of 2011investors were jittery aboutthe debt crisis in Europe. Healso blamed uncertainty in thelead-up to last October’s par-liamentary elections for thelack of interest.

Alice Trudelle

Beverages

Growth brewing for Poland’s coffee marketGreater demand forpremium coffee isgiving a jolt to sales

Tea is slowly but surely beingpushed out as Poland’s hotbeverage of choice, withincreasing numbers of Polesopting to drink coffee instead.The average Pole now drinksone cup of coffee and one cupof tea per day.

As a result, by 2015 the

value of the coffee market inPoland will have reached €1.3billion, an 8 percent increaseon last year, according to anew report from EuromonitorInternational.

“In 2010, the coffee culturebecame increasingly wide-spread and sophisticated inPoland. The aspiring genera-tion of 30- to 40-year-old con-sumers continued to show anappetite for affordable luxury

items,” Euromonitor wrote inthe report.

“This, in turn, stimulatedthe demand for premium posi-tioned coffees. In particular,fresh coffee beans, coffee pods,and specialist coffee shops ben-efited from the growing coffeeculture in Poland.”

Coffee is expected tobecome even more of a premi-um product during the periodup to 2015, which will result in

the availability of new varietiesand in turn stimulate furthergrowth, the report found.

This desire for fresh premi-um coffee made from realbeans is encouraging business-es from a wide variety of sec-tors to jump on the coffeebandwagon. In addition tonew coffee shops from chainsincluding Starbucks and Cof-feeheaven, grocery stores, gasstations and fast-food chains

are also developing facilitieswhich allow clients to enjoy acup of the beverage. And withmore locations this meansgreater competition and as aresult lower prices.

In Poland, Kraft Foods Pol-ska currently leads the way interms of market share due tosales of its premium Jacobsfamily brand and its main-stream Maxwell House brand.

David Ingham

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The government is looking to sell its 53 percent stake

in Lotos

State-owned firms

Lotos likely to be bought by domestic firm

Poland’s Treasurywants to privatize thecarrier as soon aspossible

Following Turkish Airlines’recent announcement that itwas interested in buying LotPolish Airlines, two other for-eign carriers – Air France-KLM and Lufthansa – are nowalso eying the state-controlledcompany, Polish daily Dzien-nik Gazeta Prawna wrote, cit-ing unnamed sources.

WBJ asked the Treasury toconfirm whether the compa-nies mentioned by DGP haveshown an interest in acquiringLot, but a representativedeclined to comment.

The state, via the Treasury

Ministry, currently holds a 93percent stake in the carrier,with the remaining sharesbelonging to the company’semployees.

The process of privatizingLot has been ongoing for thepast 11 years now, and theTreasury has said it would liketo finalize it as soon as possible– “by the end of 2012 at thelatest,” Treasury spokespersonMagdalena Kobos told DGP.

So far the Treasury has onlyconfirmed that two investors,one of which is Turkish Air-lines, are interested in Lot.The second interested partywishes to remain anonymous.

Ms Kobos told WBJ earlierthis year that the carrier’s pri-vatization had proved to be

“really complicated [as] this isnot a simple market.”

Ms Kobos added thatbecause of the crisis, manyfirms had not been able toaccess an adequate level offinancing for the Lot takeover.

In addition, in order for thetakeover to take place, Polishregulations would have to bemodified. Current rules stipu-late that the state has to main-tain a stake of at least 51-per-cent in the company.

Turkish Airlines recentlywon the award of “Best Airlin-er in Europe” at the 2011World Airline Awards held bySkytrax, a UK-based consul-tancy firm specializing in theairline industry. The airlinecurrently ranks as the eighth-

largest in the world.German airliner Lufthansa

won the award for “BestTransatlantic Airline.”

Air France-KLM is alsoone of the largest airlines inthe world.

Izabela Depczyk

Lot Polish Airlines

Lufthansa, Air France-KLM areinterested in Lot purchase: report

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Lot’s privatization process has been ongoing for the

past 11 years

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012BUSINESS6 www.wbj.pl

Contact: Aleksander Kowalski

ak@pnplaw.pl

Legal News

BROUGHT TO YOU BY PETER NIELSEN & PARTNERS LAW OFFICE

Selling an apartment with a discount Pursuant to the Supreme Court resolutionof January 26, 2012 (case file no. III CZP87/11), anyone who had purchased anapartment with a discount and then sold itin less than five years is obliged to returnthe part of the discount in the amount pro-portional to the amount obtained from thesale and not assigned for purchasinganother residential premises.

From February 1, higher disability insurance premiums An amendment to the Act on the SocialInsurance System came into effect onFebruary 1, 2012, which raises the disabil-ity insurance premiums that employershave to pay by 2 percentage points.Specifically, the basis for the disabilityinsurance premium has been raised from6 percent to 8 percent, which is brokendown into 1.5 percent financed by theinsured person (the employee) and 6.5percent (previously 4.5 percent) financedby the employer.

New tax on extraction of silver and copper According to the draft Act on Extraction ofCertain Minerals, the State Treasuryshould benefit from the levies imposed onextraction of sliver and copper. The taxintended to be introduced is to be basedon the price of the extracted mineral.According to the authors of the draft, the

introduction of this method of taxation onextraction is stable and predictable forinvestors interested in the exploitation ofsuch deposits in Poland.

No more double third-partymotor insurance From February 11 the changes to the acton obligatory insurance become binding.The changes are intended to, amongother things, solve the problem of the so-called “double third-party motor insur-ance.” Up till now, this problem (whichhad become quite common) occurredwhenever car owners changed their insur-ance company but forgot to submit a ter-mination notice with the previous insur-ance company before the lapse of theagreement period.

When such a termination notice wasnot submitted, the agreement was auto-matically prolonged for another year –there was virtually no possibility of termi-nating it earlier. Starting February 11, it willbe possible to terminate the prolongedagreement if the driver concluded anagreement with another insurance com-pany.

However, drivers will have to submit a ter-mination notice with regard to the automati-cally prolonged agreement, otherwise theywill have to pay for both insurances. Theproblem of double third-party motor insur-ance also occurred during the sale of sec-ond-hand vehicles. The new provisions arealso aimed at improving these issues. ●

A new report saystighter EU climaterules would costPolish industry z∏.22billion a year from2030

Higher emissions reductiontargets included in the EU’s“Energy Roadmap 2050”would cause a “drastic deterio-ration” of the competitivenessof many Polish companies andsteep financial losses, accord-ing to a new report commis-sioned by the Polish Chamberof Commerce (PCC).

Adopted by the EuropeanCommission in December2011, the new energy roadmap envisions reducing totalEU emissions by 80 to 95 per-cent from 1990 levels by 2050.That’s a minimum of fourtimes the current 20 percentreduction target for 2020.

The EC’s vision for 2050includes low-energy and low-emission housing and work-places, electric cars, a boost ininvestment and new jobs inclean technologies and energy,and annual savings of €88 bil-lion on health care and air pol-lution control.

Boles∏aw Jankowski, headof EnergSys, the consultancyfirm that drafted the report for

PCC, paints a different picturefor Poland should the roadmap be implemented. MrJankowski told journalists at aconference last Tuesday thatthe cost of implementing thenew road map for Polish com-panies would reach z∏.22 bil-lion per year by 2030. This, headded, represents more thanhalf of the total Polish industryprofits in 2009, which amount-ed to z∏.40 billion.

And these are only thecosts of climate policy. Aplanned rise in energy pricesalso has to be added to the bill,which will be paid in large part

by Poland’s energy-intensivesectors such as metals, cement,chemicals, coke, paper, coaland lignite, and wood prod-ucts. At stake are the 800,000jobs in these energy-intensivesectors, argues Mr Jankowski.

In a position paper adoptedon the basis of EnergSys’report, the PCC urges the Pol-ish government to opposeattempts to strengthen currentEU climate policy. The “Ener-gy Roadmap 2050” is sched-uled to be discussed at theEuropean Council environ-ment committee meeting onMarch 9. Alice Trudelle

Environment

PCC: EU climate policy tocost Polish industry dearly

Innovation

World Bank tells Poland how tojump-start innovationPoland lags behind ininnovation; to improve,it needs to make iteasier for businesses toconduct R&D

Poland must become far moreinnovative than it is today inorder for its economy to beable to compete effectively inthe future, said experts at aconference on innovation in

emerging economies, organ-ized by the World Bank.

The good news is that withits strong economy, as well asits academic and scientificpotential, Poland has the fun-damentals to be a very innova-tive country, said JanamitraDevan, vice president of theWorld Bank. “Poland has atradition of excellence inlearning and basic researchwhich can provide the basis for

future commercial innova-tion,” he said.

But Poland currently spendsonly about 0.9 percent of itsGDP on research and develop-ment, lagging behind Euro-pean countries such as Finlandand Sweden, which each spendover 3 percent of their GDP onR&D. Experts at the confer-ence mooted several measuresthat could help Poland boost itsinnovativeness.

First, they said, the govern-ment should support the col-laboration of Polish re-searchers and foreign inven-tors, as well as do more toattract foreign R&D invest-ment. Second, to help en-hance Polish integration intothe global R&D community,the government should sup-port local co-inventors inobtaining international patentprotection before they negoti-ate the ownership of theirjoint patents with theirWestern co-inventors.

Third, Polish research anddevelopment institutes shouldbe restructured to be moreeffective in commercializingtheir ideas. There should be athorough assessment of thereal potential of each organi-zation and the local and globaldemand for what they pro-duce. Fourth, to promote risk-taking and stimulate marketsfor private risk capital, policy-makers should evaluate sup-port instruments and developnew ones based on interna-tional best practices, such as

matching grants, loans andventure capital.

Make it easierFor reforms in innovation tomake a difference, the govern-ment also needs to improvethe ease of doing business inPoland in measurable ways.The experts said it should putspecial emphasis on aspectsvital for FDI, start-ups andspinoffs, such as making it eas-ier to start a business, givinginvestors better protection, aswell as making it easier toobtain credit and to enforcecontracts.

Mr Devan also said thereneeds to be a differentapproach to entrepreneurswho have “failed” at innova-tion. “We should not treatthose who have failed withinnovative ideas as losers. It isthe entrepreneur who hasalready failed that is most like-ly to succeed with his nextidea, due to the experience hehas garnered in the process,”he said.

Remi Adekoya

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Energy-intensive industries would be the hardest hit

by more severe EU climate rules

Gdynia port’s

z∏.451 million

upgrade

The Port of Gdynia

Authority (ZMPG), the

entity which manages the

city’s port, has announced

plans to spend over z∏.451

million between 2012 and

2014 on various repair and

modernization projects,

reported Puls Biznesu.

Work on infrastructure

improvements alone will

cost over z∏.324 million,

with the waterfront set to

be redesigned, a network

of access roads developed,

and a new loading and

logistics area created.

Newcomers on

the WIG20

The Warsaw Stock

Exchange plans to replace

builder PBG and financial

group Getin Holding with

car parts producer

Boryszew and chemicals

group Synthos on its blue-

chip WIG20 index. PGB

and Getin will in turn

replace Boryszew and

Synthos on the bourse’s

mWIG40 index. Changes

are due to take place on

March 16. ●

%

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

Slovak

ia

Romani

a

PolandHung

ary

Czech R

epublic

United K

ingdomFra

nce

Germany

Denmark

Austria

Finlan

dSw

eden

3.33.1

2.52.4 2.3

1.91.7

1.4

0.9 0.9

0.5 0.4

Lagging behindPercentage of GDP spent on R&D by selected European countries

Source: R&D Magazine (December 2010)

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 FINANCE & ECONOMICS www.wbj.pl 7

The Polish successstory appears lessinspiring when theunemployment rate istaken into account

In recent years Poland hasreceived glowing press for itseconomic performance. Thecountry made waves interna-tionally when it became theonly EU member to registerpositive GDP growth in thecrisis year of 2009.

Since then much has beenmade of Poland’s consistent,dynamic economic growth,which it achieved in the face ofless-than-favorable externalconditions.

But despite its recent eco-

nomic performance, the coun-try continues to have a stub-bornly high unemploymentrate that many economists saycasts a shadow on the “suc-cessful market transforma-tion” narrative.

Worse than two decades agoIn January this year, theunemployment rate in Polandwas 13.3 percent, according togovernment statistics, mean-ing over two million peoplewere out of work. This meansthe jobless rate today is higherthan it was in 1991 (when itwas 12.2 percent), two yearsafter the initial mass layoffsthat followed the collapse ofthe communist government.

Unemployment in otherpost-communist EU countriesis significantly lower. Forexample, unemploymentstood at 8 percent in the CzechRepublic as of last Novemberand at 7.2 percent in Romaniain mid-2011.

Even Hungary, whoseeconomy has taken a batteringin recent years, had unemploy-ment of 10.7 percent at theend of 2011.

Eurostat, the EU’s statisticsagency, which uses a differentmethodology (it doesn’t countas unemployed those whohave given up looking for workaltogether) has Polish unem-ployment at 9.9 percent, butthat figure is still high, com-pared with its regional EUpeers.

The figures paint an espe-cially stark picture when con-sidering that roughly two mil-lion people have left Poland’slabor market in search ofgreener pastures since thecountry joined the EU in 2004.

Causes regional, generationalOne major factor behindPoland’s stubbornly highunemployment figures, ex-perts say, is geography. Vari-ous parts of Poland show vast-

ly different joblessness rates.For instance, the War-

miƒsko-Mazurskie voivodshipin the northeast has an unem-ployment rate of greater than20 percent, while in the west-ern Wielkopolskie voivodshipit’s just 9.2 percent.

Jobs are hardest to find inthe eastern regions, which areless developed than westernareas of Poland and were onceheavily reliant on agriculture.

Another important factor isthat unemployment is increas-ingly becoming a generationalproblem. At the end of lastyear, 29.4 percent of the coun-try’s unemployed werebetween the ages of 25 and 34.

Labor laws and high expectations“Jobs are not being created onthe scale that they should be.The crisis, high taxes on workand the existence of the grayeconomy all contribute to that,”said Dominika Staniewicz,labor market expert at the Busi-ness Center Club (BCC).

Regarding high youthunemployment, Ms Staniewiczsaid, “Many young peoplewant to receive a lot of money,which they don’t deserve, atthe start of their careers.”

She also pointed to labor

laws, such as the fact thatemployees over the age of 56receive “special governmentprotection” that means it ispractically impossible to firethem.

As a result, many firmstend to fire people before theyreach that age. Needless tosay, out-of-work citizens overthe age of 56 have troublefinding new jobs for exactly thesame reasons that causedthem to lose their previousemployment positions.

The solution, Ms Staniewiczsays, is “the opposite of whatthe government is doing … soreduce social contributions for

employers and do somethingabout the laws regarding high-risk workers for employees.”

Poland’s economic achieve-ments over the past twodecades have been consider-able. But those achievementswon’t be sustainable if thecountry’s labor system remainsso inflexible. Indeed, if noreforms are made, economistssay, long-term growthprospects could be jeopard-ized and entrepreneurship dis-couraged, all of which couldresult in high levels of structur-al unemployment in Polandfor years to come.

Remi Adekoya

Remuneration

Wage report highlightseast-west dividePeople in Poland’seastern regions earnfar less than theircolleagues in westernPoland

Employees in Warsaw,Wroc∏aw and Poznaƒ arePoland’s top earners, whilethose in Bia∏ystok, Lublin andOpole bring home the least,according to a recent survey ofsalaries carried out by consul-tancy firm Sedlak & Sedlak.

The average monthly wagein Warsaw is z∏.5,500, The nexthighest-earning cities wereWroc∏aw (z∏.4,300), Poznaƒ(z∏.4,200), Gdaƒsk (z∏.4,100),Katowice (z∏.4,000) andKraków (z∏.4,000).

Meanwhile, out of the 16Polish cities surveyed, people inBia∏ystok earned the least onaverage at z∏.3,000 per month.Next lowest were Lublin(z∏.3,020), Opole (z∏.3,250),Rzeszów (z∏.3,300), Olsztyn(z∏.3,300) and Kielce (z∏.3,300).

The ranking reflectsPoland’s east-west divide:those living in eastern parts ofthe country generally earn lessthan those in western regions.The biggest exception to this

rule is Warsaw. Though it isgeographically located in theeastern half of the country, thecapital has the country’s high-est average wage.

Most foreign investment inPoland flows into Warsaw andwestern parts of the country,while the country’s easterncities have struggled to attractcapital.

“In our opinion, the reasonfor the low number of invest-ments in cities like Bia∏ystokstems from the fact that the

eastern region is under-devel-oped as far as infrastructureand technology is concerned,”said Lucjan Zaborowski fromSedlak & Sedlak.

“To make matters worse,the region’s skilled workersmove away to other cities tofind better opportunities, thusreducing the attractiveness ofthe east’s labor market forpotential new investors,” hesaid, lamenting the “viciouscycle” that has been created.

Remi Adekoya

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11

12

13

14

15

Jan. 20

12

Dec. 20

11

Nov. 20

11

Oct. 20

11

Sep. 20

11

Aug. 20

11

Jul. 20

11

Jun. 20

11

May 20

11

Apr. 20

11

Mar. 20

11

Feb. 20

11

Jan. 20

11

Stubbornly highPoland's unemployment rate over the past 13 months

Source: Central Statistical Office

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Over 2 million Poles need a job

DAILY EXECUTIVE DIGEST

S i g n u p f o r a 2 - w e e k f r e e - t r i a l ! w w w. p o l a n d a m . p lG e r m a n v e r s i o n : w w w. p o l e n a mm o r g e n . p l

Poland A.M. gives you the biggest Polish stories of the day.

Have the most valuable news delivered to your inbox each weekday morning.

Capital gainsAverage monthly wage in 16 selected Polish cities

Warsaw z∏.5,500

Wroc∏aw z∏.4,300

Poznaƒ z∏.4,200

Gdaƒsk z∏.4,100

Katowice z∏.4,000

Kraków z∏.4,000

Szczecin z∏.3,666

¸ódê z∏.3,500

Bydgoszcz z∏.3,400

Zielona Góra z∏.3,375

Kielce z∏.3,300

Olsztyn z∏.3,300

Rzeszów z∏.3,300

Opole z∏.3,250

Lublin z∏.3,020

Bia∏ystok z∏.3,000

Source: Sedlak & Sedlak

Labor market

Poland: strong growth, high unemployment

FEBRUARY 13-19, 20128 www.wbj.pl INTERVIEW

Sino-Polish relations

An upgraded partnership

Ewa Boniecka: How do youassess the impact of therecently signed agreement forestablishing a strategic part-nership between China andPoland?Sun Yuxi: Establishing a strate-gic partnership between Chinaand Poland is a very goodbeginning for a new chapter inSino-Polish relations. Whileour mutual relations have beenvery good over the years, thestrategic partnership agree-ment upgrades them to a high-er and more comprehensivelevel. We are now living in atime when all countries in theworld are concentrating ontheir economic development,and on delivering higher stan-dards of living for their people.This strategic partnershipagreement means that we havea common desire to completethis development. While Chinais the biggest developing coun-try in the world and is animportant player in Asia,Poland is the biggest country in

Central and Eastern Europeand an important member ofthe European Union.

The strategic partnershipbetween our countries hasmeaning going beyond ourmutual relations. Naturally, firstof all, we want to upgrade ourmutual relations, [but] upgrad-ing them would [also] meanthat Poland would have a moreactive presence in Asia andChina in Eastern Europe. Ourstrategic partnership alsomeans closer cooperationbetween Poland and China indealing with major world issues,so it will have a positive impacton the international scene.

China had already signed astrategic partnership with theEuropean Union, yet it alsosigned the same deal with sev-eral individual members ofthe EU. What are the criteriafor concluding strategic part-nership agreements?Poland is the first countryamong new EU member states

that has signed an individualstrategic partnership agreementwith China. Such agreementsare always signed with countriesthat have a strong economicposition and political influencein their region, such as France,Germany, Italy and nowPoland. The aim for establish-ing strategic partnerships is toraise political contacts to a high-er level and obtain governmentsupport for developing eco-nomic relations under the rulesof a market economy.

During President Komorows-ki’s visit to China at the endof 2011, there were variousagreements signed. Which inyour view is the most impor-tant for the development ofPolish-Chinese relations?The basis for all agreements isthe joint statement on strate-gic partnership, which wassigned by the two countries’presidents. It sets the directionfor the development of ourrelations in every area, be itpolitical, economic, financial,cultural or educational.

In my view, the basis fordeveloping closer relationsbetween China and Poland isto build better understandingbetween our peoples, because

they – among them managers,businesspeople and state rep-resentatives, are the ones whoconduct our relations. Themore they understand eachother and our countries’ aims,

customs and historical tradi-tions, the better they will beable to work together.

So I will point to agree-ments that were signed on aministerial level, concerningcultural and educational coop-eration, and exchange of stu-dents and scholars, as well as tothe opening of new Polish-lan-guage university departmentsin China and Chinese-lan-guage departments in Poland.

One thing that is very help-ful for facilitating businesscontacts and the developmentof tourism is the agreement tobegin operating a direct flightfrom Warsaw to Beijing. The

first Lot Polish Airlines planewill fly there in June. Thereare also prospects for estab-lishing additional direct con-nections from Poland to otherChinese cities, like Shanghai.So in the future Warsaw couldbecome a center for airlinetransportation between Eas-tern Europe and China.

Let’s move now to the fields ofeconomics and business. Chi-

nese machinery groupLiuGong has signed a con-tract to purchase the civilianarm of Polish state-ownedconstruction machinery man-ufacturer Huta Stalowa Wola.Will this asset now be Chineseproperty?It will be joint Chinese-Polishproperty, with some shares inthat private company belong-ing to LiuGong, which is listedon the stock market in Shang-

“The strategicpartnershipagreement

upgrades Sino-Polish relations to

a higher level”

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Ambassador Sun Yuxi says that both Poland and China

have drawn lessons from the “unfortunate” COVEC

incident

Sun Yuxi, the Chinese ambassador to Poland,talks with WBJ about the importance of thenewly signed strategic partnership betweenChina and Poland and its impact on thedevelopment of relations between the twocountries

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 INTERVIEW www.wbj.pl 9

hai, and some by the Polishside. Production will be con-tinuously operated by Polishworkers and most managerswill be Polish, with someadded Chinese specialists.

The negotiations betweenLiuGong and Polish represen-tatives and trade unions lastedfor quite a long time. All of thedetails have been taken careof, so LiuGong is now well-prepared to fulfill the deal. Ithink, by the way, that the Chi-nese and Polish sides havedrawn lessons from the unfor-tunate COVEC experience,when that Chinese firm failedto realize the contract forbuilding part of the A2 motor-way in Poland.

In our trade exchange there isgreat imbalance on the Polishside – Poland imports a lotfrom China but exports arequite small. How can this bechanged? In the first half of 2011, ourbilateral trade volume was$6.01 billion, but $5.08 billionwere imports from China andonly $0.93 billion were Polishexports to China. During Pres-ident Komorowski’s visit thisissue was discussed and Chinawill open its market for Polishproducts. There will be anincrease in the amount of agri-cultural products we importfrom Poland, among thempork, dairy products andvodka. Chinese people havealready developed a taste forPolish vodka and they aregreat consumers of vodkafrom around the world.

Poland has very advancedtechnology in the mining sec-tor and good opportunities forobtaining renewable energy,so there are real possibilitiesfor increasing Poland’s exportoffer. An agreement hasalready been signed betweenthe chairman of [Polish copperminer] KGHM and our com-pany China Minmetals for thedelivery of copper to China.The value of that contract is$3.5 billion. And I know thatthere are more ongoing con-sultations and direct talksbetween our companies topush trade forward. Both sidesare keen to reduce the currentimbalance.

China has a similar imbal-ance in trade with other Euro-pean countries and also withthe US. Our economic policyis now focused on increasingimports to China.

China wants to enter Poland’sbanking market. What con-crete efforts is it making?Our Industrial and Commer-cial Bank of China (ICBC),which has branches all overthe world, is now going toopen a branch in Warsaw,probably in May. Another one,Bank of China, is going toopen one in March. Also, ourChina Development Bank isinterested in coming toPoland. Those banks will helpChinese companies to invest inPoland and will also offer

some banking services to Pol-ish companies interested inexporting to and investing inChina.

The Chinese economy is nowthe second-largest in theworld and you have huge for-eign currency reserves. Howare you working with Europewhen it comes to the currenteconomic crisis?We want to play a constructiverole in handling the crisis andwe will continue to make acontribution. We have alreadybought quite a lot of debt andbank bonds from troubledcountries, like Greece. We aretrying to make investments inEuropean countries and to

balance our trade with them.This year we plan to send hun-dreds of delegations abroad totalk about purchasing Euro-pean goods.

The solution to the presentcrisis is to help the globaleconomy to recover, and whileChina has not so far beenaffected by that crisis andkeeps a high rate of GDPgrowth, the crisis did still affectour foreign trade in 2009. So inthe world of the global marketeconomy, we are linked toeach other and we have tomake joint efforts to combatthe crisis.

China’s current five-year planfocuses on increasing domes-tic spending and consump-tion. Would it also open theway to increasing imports toChina? Yes, because one of the resultsof the plan will be a fasterprocess of urbanization. By theend of 2011, the urban popula-tion already exceeded 51 per-cent of our total population.That transfer of peoplerequires new houses, roads,schools and other services.The money for investmentswould come partially fromcentral and local governments,but mostly from the privatesector. This means that we willneed to import technologies,services and goods for newurban consumers. China ischanging: Western culture isaccepted in big cities, Euro-pean goods and clothing arevery popular and we have thegreatest number of McDon-ald’s restaurants in the world.

All this means that there isroom for foreign businesses inevery sector of life. Forinstance, W.Kruk, the famousPolish jeweler, wants to open achain of shops in China, inpartnership with a Chinesefirm. I believe they will achievesuccess because amber jewelrywill be very popular in China,where amber is regarded as asymbol of health.

And how is Chinese culturepromoted abroad?I think the “cultural offensive”is not a one-way street. Chi-nese culture is part of globalcivilization and there is andalways was a great interest inour culture and language allover the world. People likeChinese art and celebrate Chi-nese New Year – we recentlycelebrated the beginning ofthe Year of the Dragon. For-eigners study Chinese lan-guages in hundreds of collegesall over the world, and inPoland there are four Confu-cius Institutes where it’s possi-ble to study Chinese – in Poz-naƒ, Kraków, Opole andWroc∏aw. One more is goingto be opened in Gdaƒsk. TheChinese language is becomingthe second-most-spoken busi-ness language, after English.

China is perceived as beingone of the emerging politicalgiants, as part of the group ofBRIC countries How do yousee the situation?The BRIC countries share thecommon characteristic of beingfast-developing countries.Together, we already producehalf of the world’s economicoutput, so our cooperation isgood for the world economy asa whole. While the GDPs ofrich countries in Europe andNorth America are shrinking,BRIC countries are maintain-ing economic growth. It is anew drive in the world’s devel-opment. With huge popula-tions and good outlooks forfurther development, BRICcountries, however internallydifferent, are becoming both aneconomic and political force tobe reckoned with on the inter-national scene.

You have served as Chineseambassador to Poland for ayear and a half already. In thattime you have seen our mutualrelations raised to the status ofstrategic partnership. Do youenvisage the visit of the Chi-nese president to Poland dur-ing your time as ambassador?Within the next year we willhave a change of government.The Chinese president,according to the constitution,can only serve for two terms.So President Hu Jintao willend his term soon and we willhave a new president. I hopethe new president will visitPoland as soon as possible andin the meantime we will con-tinue to send high-level repre-sentatives to visit one another.

I hope that later in myambassadorship in Polandthere will be more meaningfulprogress in the developmentof our mutual relations. Andmaybe I will have a chance towalk through the renovatedChinese Alley in the ¸azienkiPark in Warsaw, which wasfirst created during the timeof Polish King Stanis∏awAugust Poniatowski. The ren-ovation is going to be carriedout jointly by Polish and Chi-nese investors. ●

“Chinese peoplehave already

developed a tastefor Polish vodka”

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012OPINION & ANALYSIS10 www.wbj.pl

Many observers have recentlydeclared that the euro-zonedebt crisis is practically

resolved, or at least on hold for a fewyears. The falling yields at the Italiangovernment’s last bond auctions in2011 suggested a significant reductionin the perceived sovereign-defaultrisk.

The “solution” to the crisis wasputatively facilitated by the EuropeanCentral Bank’s decision to lend unlim-ited funds to commercial banks forthree-year terms at very low rates. Buta central bank would normally doeven more to fulfill its role as lender oflast resort. So why all the renewedoptimism?

A fundamental flawThe immediate answer is that nation-al banks will now use the scheme toborrow cheaply from the ECB andinvest in short-term sovereign bonds,using the interest-rate spread to cre-ate a profitable “sovereign carrytrade.” Despite the inefficiencies anddistortions arising from such mone-tary financing, the ECB may indeed

provide some breathing space for gov-ernments.

But the real reason why this other-wise standard policy decision seemslike such an important step is that, forthe first time, the ECB has recognizedthe need to address a fundamentalflaw in the euro zone’s architecture:the ECB itself.

At the core of the problem is cur-rency. In the 1990s, emerging-marketcrises were first and foremost curren-cy crises: sharp corrections of overval-ued currencies that bankrupted publicand private sector debtors.

By contrast, the currency issue inthe European crisis is difficult to pin-point. Is Italian euro debt denominat-ed in local or foreign currency?Whose currency is the euro? Andwhose central bank is the ECB? Thesequestions are key to the Europeanpredicament. Indeed, the possibleanswers suggest two very differentversions of the euro zone.

Two versionsOne version of the euro zone con-ceives it as a unity, externally and fis-

cally balanced, and with a fully func-tioning monetary union. It is alsoheavily indebted, but in domestic cur-rency. The alternative conceptionassumes that the euro zone is a groupof individual countries within a com-mon currency area. Most of the coun-tries are unbalanced and are indebtedin a currency (the euro) that they can-not print on demand. This is equiva-lent to foreign-currency debt.

In the first version (the euro crisisminus the currency problem), the sce-nario looks more like the UnitedStates than like Latin America in the1990s (with Italy resembling Califor-nia rather than Argentina). In the sec-ond version, however, the euro-zonesaga is comparable to the emergingmarkets’ story. Like a dysfunctionalfamily, the northern “advanced” coun-tries ponder whether or not to bail outthe southern “emerging” economies.

The prognoses for each case arestarkly different. In the former ver-sion, interest rates converge and thedefault risk is nil, because, with theECB backstopping its members’ liabil-ities, as the Federal Reserve does in

the US, the euro becomes “local cur-rency.”

In the latter version of the eurozone, there is differential credit riskand, ultimately, bank runs, “de-euroization,” and default: the com-mon currency is at odds with theneeds of the member states.

Which of these two alternativesshould prevail is a question for euro-zone members to decide. But twothings are clear. First, the euro zone’sfuture will be determined largely bythe ECB’s role. Second, there is littleflexibility – European policymakerscannot overcome the crisis if they donot eliminate the currency problemand the resulting default risk.

This helps to explain the misgiv-ings about the International MonetaryFund’s massive aid to the region. Whywould the IMF lend Europe specialdrawing rights (the Fund’s unit ofaccount), rather than euros, therebycreating a currency imbalance? Suchan imbalance is at the root of allemerging-market crises; the IMF’sactions therefore suggest that Europeis already giving up on the euro.

The road not takenToday, the euro faces a fork in theroad. One route, a currency area with-out sovereign backstopping, will leadto debt, currency crises, and the eurozone’s dissolution. The other, a mone-tary union with a proper central bank,internal fiscal transfers, and active,regionally-oriented monetary policy,will lead to a slow but steady recoverywithout default.

Clearly, to paraphrase RobertFrost, the road taken will make all thedifference. For that reason, the euro’sfate lies not in Athens, or in Rome,but at the ECB’s headquarters inFrankfurt. ●

Mario I. Blejer is a former governorof the Central Bank of Argentina and

former director of the Center for Central Banking Studies at the

Bank of England. Eduardo Levy Yeyati is professor of

economics at Universidad Torcuato DiTella and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2012.project-syndicate.org

The euro zone’s fork in the roadMario I. Blejer, Eduardo L. Yeyati

STRATFOR has long followedand chronicled Russia’s resur-gence, which has included bolder

foreign policy moves and resumingthe role of regional power.

In recent years, Russia hasincreased its influence in manyEstearn European states politically,economically, militarily and in thearea of security, with the most obvioussign of its return to power coming inthe August 2008 war with Georgia.Now, Moscow is preparing for thenext stage of its resurgence. This newphase will include the institutionaliza-tion of Russia’s position as the region-al hub, but will also include the use ofmore subtle levers and influence inareas Moscow wants to bring into itsfold – though not all of these effortswill go unchallenged.

The geopolitics of the Russian resurgenceIn many ways, Russia’s geopoliticalstrength is derived from its inherentgeographic weaknesses. There are fewnatural barriers protecting Russia’score, and this has required Russia toexpand into and consolidate territo-ries around its core to acquire buffersfrom external powers. With the ArcticOcean serving as the only natural bar-

rier for Russia to the north, thisexpansion historically has requiredRussia to push to the west towardEurope (consolidating EasternEurope and the Baltics), to the southtoward the Islamic world (consolidat-ing the Caucasus), and to the easttoward Asia (consolidating CentralAsia and Siberia). As Russia absorbedpeoples and resources, it grew from asmall Eastern European principalityin the 13th century to the GrandDuchy of Moscow, which became theRussian Empire and then grew tobecome the Soviet Union, one of thelargest contiguous states in history.

However, this expansion createdtwo fundamental problems for anyRussian state: it brought Moscow intoconflict with numerous external pow-ers and gave it the difficult task of rul-ing over conquered peoples (whowere not necessarily happy to be ruledby Russia). Russia’s geographyrequires it to expand to stay strong,but paradoxically, the more Russiapushes outward the more difficult andcostly it becomes to rule its immenseterritory. Meanwhile, Russia’s lack ofaccess to the wider oceans hascemented its position as a land powerbut doomed it economically andweakened its position compared to

other powers that have ready access tothe world’s oceans. Such factors havecreated a cycle in which Russia’spower rises and collapses. When Rus-sia is on the rise, it becomes a majorregional if not global player, and whenit falls it is only a matter of time beforeit rises again.

So when the Soviet Union col-lapsed in 1991 at the end of the ColdWar and Moscow lost control of itsconstituent republics and fell intointernal chaos, those circumstancesdid not guarantee that Russia was per-manently removed from the interna-tional scene and that a unipolar worlddominated by the United Stateswould last forever. Certainly by theend of the 1990s, Russia was severelyweakened as a geopolitical power; itseconomy was in chaos and it faced amilitary defeat in Chechnya, whichgained de facto independence andthreatened to spur similar movementswithin Russia proper.

But things began to change withthe beginning of the new millennium.Starting with Vladimir Putin’s presi-dency in 2000, Russia was able toreverse its losses in another more suc-cessful war in Chechnya, and Russia’sposition in its former Soviet peripherybegan to rise steadily. Numerous fac-

tors played into this, including theinternal consolidation led by Mr Putinto overcome the chaos of the 1990s,high global energy prices and the USinvolvement in the Islamic world.

In the past few years, most of thepro-Western color revolutions thatswept the former Soviet Union in theearly 2000s have been reversed. Rus-sia has increased its military footprintin many of these states and is in theprocess of creating economic institu-tions to match (most notably its cus-toms union with Belarus and Kaza-khstan that is set to become theEurasian Union). In short, Russia hasreturned to its traditional status oflegitimate regional power, and itsinfluence is increasing in its historicgeographic buffer zones, which arecurrently made up of more than adozen independent states.

Looking aheadIn the context of its resurgence, Rus-sia’s broad imperative has been toprevent foreign influence while build-ing and ingraining its own. Of course,Russia’s plans for carrying out thisimperative differ in each sub-region ofthe former Soviet Union – EasternEurope, the Baltics, the Caucasus andCentral Asia – and in each state.

Russia’s resurgence has not beenseamless. Since gaining independ-ence, each former Soviet state hasdeveloped its own imperatives: con-solidating power internally and main-taining some sort of sovereignty. Also,different external powers are compet-ing with Russia for influence in eachformer Soviet country. Therefore, theimperatives of Russia and the otherformer Soviet states often clash, whichsometimes leads to dynamic and occa-sionally volatile relations, even withsome of Moscow’s most loyal allies.

But power is a relative concept,and right now most former Sovietstates are too weak to independentlystand up to Russia and most externalpowers cannot match the strengthRussia wields in its periphery. Andwith Mr Putin set to return to thepresidency and begin a new chapterfor the Russian state, it is important togauge the progress Moscow has madein its resurgence in the former SovietUnion and what this projection ofRussian power will mean in thefuture. ●

“The next stage of Russia’s resurgence” is republished with

permission of STRATFOR.STRATFOR.com

The next stage of Russia’s resurgenceSTRATFOR

CO-MANAGING EDITOR

GARETH PRICE(GPRICE@WBJ.PL)

CO-MANAGING EDITOR

ALICE TRUDELLE(ATRUDELLE@WBJ.PL)

POLITICS EDITOR

REMI ADEKOYA(RADEKOYA@WBJ.PL)

REAL ESTATE EDITORADAM ZDRODOWSKI(AZDRODOWSKI@WBJ.PL)

COPY EDITORSDAVID INGHAMELLA PA¸KA

INTERNSIZABELA DEPCZYK VERONIKA JOY

CONTRIBUTORSE. BLAKE BERRYEWA BONIECKAMARK ORDONLIAM NOLAN

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PRODUCTION MANAGERPIOTR WYSKOK

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MARKETING &SALES

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Editorials are the opinions of WBJ’s editorial board. Other opinions are those of the authors alone. Comments, opinions and letters should be sent to editor@wbj.pl. Please include a name and contact information and clearly indicate if they are to be considered for publication.

Better late than never

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 OPINION & ANALYSIS www.wbj.pl 11

Editorial

We are not sure whether theratification of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade

Agreement (ACTA) will be good forPolish business or not – that remainsto be seen. But we can be sure thatit’s a good thing that the governmenthas finally decided to hold a publicconsultation over the treaty’s ratifica-tion, which has so galvanized publicanger.

Let it be a lesson to politiciansthat the internet has become an indis-pensable element of everyday life:Consider the lamentations of thosewho, for one reason or another, haveto do without internet service for anyperiod of time. People who only 15years ago knew nothing of e-mail orwebsites now feel completely isolatedwithout access to Facebook.

The world changes at an increas-ingly rapid pace, and that’s in partbecause of the internet. But it helpsus to keep up with those changes aswell. And, especially for young peo-

ple but increasingly for just aboutanyone, the internet is an essentialpart of both work and leisure.

It is no wonder that attempts toregulate internet use are met withscrutiny and resistance. Changes con-tained within ACTA – which oppo-nents argue will be sweeping – couldhave been expected to cause a publicoutcry.

So Prime Minister Tusk movedrelatively deftly, ignoring the protestslong enough to have the treaty signedby an ambassador, and putting on theproper face for the internationalcommunity – and US allies – whowould have recoiled if Poland hadrejected the treaty outright. Oncethat was done, Mr Tusk put the ratifi-cation process on hold, apologizedfor not having consulted the public,and promptly held a debate on theissue. (See story, p. 4.)

By all accounts, that debate was aflop – nothing was decided or madeclearer. But Mr Tusk can now claimto have consulted the public and waiteither for tempers to cool or foranother country to reject ACTA’s rat-ification before he makes a final deci-sion on the legislation.

In the meantime, Mr Tusk hascommitted to publishing as manygovernment documents related toACTA as possible. In theory this is anoble gesture, giving people access toimportant information regarding thetreaty. In practice, it will mostly just

add to the mountains of documenta-tion surrounding the issue and con-tained in ACTA itself, likely only con-fusing anyone patient enough towade through it all.

What is really needed is an expla-nation of how opponents’ concernswill be addressed. To what degreewill ACTA limit the uploading ofcontent on the internet? Will web-sites that don’t post copyrighted

material be affected? What preciselyconstitutes copyright infringement?All of these questions and manymore need to be answered before thePolish public will accept ratificationof ACTA.

We can only hope that the govern-ment will provide answers to thosequestions. Mr Tusk has pledged topublish a “commentary” explainingprecisely how ACTA would work in

practice. That sounds like a goodidea. If only the government haddone that of its own accord prior tosigning ACTA, it might have avoidedthis controversy altogether. ●

Warsaw Business Journal’s edito-rial board comprises editor-in-chief

Andrew Kureth, co-managing editorsGareth Price and Alice Trudelle, and

politics editor Remi Adekoya.

For hundreds of years, Polandsuffered from an overbearingGermany that trampled on the

rights of the Polish nation, occupiedthe country, and, at times, worked toextinguish the Polish nation-stateentirely. No wonder that there is aresidue of skepticism and caution inPoland when it comes to relationswith its big neighbor to the west. Ahealthy distance and dose of hedginghave long been the default position ofthe country’s foreign policy. Poland’saccession to the European Union haschanged all that. Nearly eight yearson, Poland is rephrasing its Germanquestion, and in a baffling way: Howclose is too close?

Fiscal treatyPoland recently consented to a Euro-pean agreement that it did not like inthe interest of keeping the continenttogether. European leaders hadagreed on a fiscal compact, a treatyaimed at strengthening the fiscal dis-cipline in the EU countries thatchoose to sign it, and set governingrules for the euro zone. Prime Minis-ter Donald Tusk faced an uncomfort-able choice.

On one hand, Poland has declareditself a staunchly pro-European coun-try. In his now-famous Berlin speechlast year, Polish Foreign MinisterRados∏aw Sikorski spoke of the needfor a strong, united, and even federal

union. On the other hand, the eurozone was potentially moving aheadwithout Poland. The plan shaping upahead of the summit called for meet-ings of the 17 euro-zone countries,excluding Poland from what is seen inWarsaw as a vital decision-makingbody of a changing EU. Consequent-ly, Mr Tusk threatened that Polandmight not sign the treaty if this mech-anism was not changed.

In Warsaw, euro-zone summitsare not simply seen as a crisis man-agement mechanism for the euro, butas a nucleus of a smaller club in whichmost of the key decisions for the EUare made, some in areas beyond thesingle currency. France is the mostactive proponent of euro zone-onlysolutions, and a zero-sum gamebetween France and Poland hasdeveloped around the question of atwo-speed Europe. Warsaw fears thatFrance wants to undo the EU’s east-ern enlargement. Seen from Warsaw,inclusion is a core national interest;Poland did not join the EuropeanUnion only to find itself sidelined.

The other euro-zone membersfaced a dilemma of their own. Nodemocratic theory stipulates thatnonmembers ought to have votingrights in membership organizations.Since voting rights for nonmembersare out of the question, the groupconsidered the PNV principle – “par-ticipate, not vote.” But even speaking

rights would give nonmembers theopportunity to influence, and maybeeven undermine, goals that memberstates deem essential to sustainingtheir common currency. Nonmem-bers should not benefit from the cur-rency union while not contributing toit, and nonmembers should have anincentive to join.

Keeping Poland in the coldBut strict exclusion of nonmembers isin nobody’s interest. Some nonmem-bers are really “not-yet-members.”They are, like Poland, candidatecountries working to qualify and wait-ing for the right moment to join. Theyhave a right to know what’s going onin the club they are aspiring to join.The more the euro-zone coordinatesto save its currency, the more it willmake decisions that affect all 27 EUmembers. They might pertain tocompetitiveness, social systems, andtaxes.

Keeping Poland in the cold is leastof all in Germany’s interest. Poland isthe most pro-European country out-side the euro zone. Why alienate it?Recently, Germany got a taste ofwhat that might mean when Mr Siko-rski warned that Germany should noteven try to aspire to be a benevolenthegemon. Poland is Germany’s cru-cial ally for a more federal Europeand a power to help balance the lessambitious Brits and the more confed-

erate French. Poland is essential inorder to lead Central and EasternEurope towards the euro zone andprevent Europe from splitting in two.It has rarely had a more central rolein Europe and has never been a morepivotal partner of Germany.

In true European fashion, this ledto a compromise, albeit an ugly one.The agreement allows non-euro-zonecountries to take part in the euro-zone summits at least once a year,and whenever issues of competitive-ness or the architecture of the eurozone are discussed.

An unhappy Mr Tusk contendsthe agreement still establishes a deci-sion-making format in which Polanddoes not have a vote, and frequentlywill not even be present at the delib-erations. Nonetheless, Poland decid-ed to join the other 24 signatories(the UK and the Czech Republicwere the holdouts), marking yetanother time that Poland chose“more Europe” when presented witha choice. The Europe Poland ischoosing is less and less to its liking,but it is easier to influence the clubfrom the inside than from the out-side.

Despite a building relationshipwith Germany, Warsaw’s support ofBerlin’s leadership in Europe is any-thing but unconditional, “Providedyou [Germany] will include us in deci-sion-making, Poland will support

you,” Mr Sikorski emphasized in hisBerlin speech. Poland knows that itcannot always count on unwaveringsupport from its western neighbor,especially if Germany had to choosebetween Poland and France. Prime

Minister Tusk’s goal now is to broad-en Poland’s alliances within the eurozone, starting with Spain and Italy.Germany will have to earn Poland’ssupport. ●

Michal Baranowski is the seniorprogram officer for foreign policy andcivil society in the German Marshall

Fund’s Warsaw office. ThomasKleine-Brockhoff is a senior fellow

and senior director for strategy at theGMF’s Washington, DC office.

Copyright: German Marshall Fundof the United States

gmfus.org

“The Europe Poland ischoosing is less and less

to its liking, but it iseasier to influence the

club from the insidethan from the outside”

“By all accountsthe ACTA debatewas a flop:Nothing was madeclearer”

Poland and Germany: How close is too close?Micha∏ Baranowski

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012COVER STORY12

Multimedia

Polska

up for sale

The current shareholders

of Multimedia Polska, one

of the largest cable TV

operators on the Polish

market, have decided to

sell the company. This is

expected to be the

second-largest

consolidation transaction

ever in the market – after

last year’s acquisition of

operator Aster by UPC

Polska. According to

Dziennik Gazeta Prawna,

Telekomunikacja Polska,

Netia, UPC Polska, PTC,

as well as several

investment funds, are all

interested in buying

Multimedia Polska.

PGE to invest

z∏.330 billion

by 2035Poland’s top utility PGE

wants to invest around

z∏.330 billion through

2035, the company said

last week. The total

amount includes plans to

increase and update its

capacity from 13.1

gigawatts today to 15.8

GW in 2020 and 21.3 GW

in 2035. It also includes

launching Poland’s first

nuclear power plant and

investing in shale gas

exploration.

Orlen to

diversify

In 2012, Poland’s top

refiner PKN Orlen plans

to intensify drilling for

shale gas, continue

exploring for crude oil

and start construction on

its planned z∏.1.5 billion,

450-500 megawatt gas-

fired power plant project

in W∏oc∏awek. Upon

releasing its full-year

results last week, the firm

admitted that 2011 had

been a difficult year, with

low refining margins,

surging oil prices and

depreciation of the z∏oty

hitting the company’s

performance. While the

firm pocketed z∏.3.7

billion from the sale of its

shares in Polkomtel, its

refining segment was

barely profitable, and its

retail segment’s operating

profit dropped nearly by

half. ●

www.wbj.pl

Film industry

A littlemovie magicPoland’s film industryhas transformed itselfin recent years, but isthe country reallymaking the most of itsmovie-makingpotential?

As Hollywood once againgears up for its biggest night ofthe year, with the 84th Acade-my Awards ceremony just twoweeks away, Polish directorAgnieszka Holland will behoping to join fellow PolesAndrzej Wajda and RomanPolanski in becoming anOscar-winning director.

Ms Holland’s latest movie,“In Darkness,” which tells thestory of Pole Leopold Socha, aformer criminal who risked hisown life during World War IIto shelter Jewish citizens, iscurrently tipped as one of thefavorites to win this year’s BestForeign Language Film award.

And if the movie is an-nounced as a winner at theKodak Theatre come Febru-ary 26, it won’t only be TinselTown celebrating to the soundof popping champagne corks.In ̧ ódê too, where the majori-ty of the film was shot in a pro-duction partially paid for bythe ¸ódê Film Fund, celebra-tions would no doubt be rau-cous.

“If people see that this filmwas made in Poland, that itwas made by Polish filmmak-ers, then it can have a realimpact on the county’s filmindustry,” Paulina Bez, aspokesperson for the Polish

Film Institute (PISF), toldWBJ.

However, while the Polishfilm industry may now finditself within reach of a majortriumph, it was until recentlyin a dire state of repair.

Changing timesBetween 2000 and 2004 therewas a significant decline in thenumber of feature film pro-ductions in Poland. Duringthis period only 20 projects,most of which were low-budg-et indie or made-for-TVmovies, were made due to alack of both state and privatefunding for domestically madefilm projects.

But 2005 proved to be apivotal year for the country’sstagnating film industry, withthe passing of the Cinematog-raphy Act. This led to the cre-ation of the Polish Film Insti-tute and also helped deter-

mine the amount of statefunding that Poland’s under-performing film industrywould receive.

Currently, state funding forPolish or Polish and interna-tional co-productions can beobtained from 12 regional filmfunds, with the individual

regional authority deciding theamount it will allocate eachyear to support domestic orco-production projects.

In addition, filmmakersand script writers can gain

funds from PISF, a body whichwas specifically created inorder to promote domesticfilms both at home andabroad, while also offeringfinancial assistance to film-makers in the form of subsi-dies and grants.

“Our main goal is to helpPolish film production … Pol-ish filmmakers can get grantsfrom us for feature films, doc-umentaries and animations.We also support film produc-tion by giving grants for scriptsand the development of filmprojects” said Ms Bez.

In 2012, from a total budg-et of z∏.127 million, the insti-tute’s planned budget for filmprojects amounts to somez∏.88.5 million. This is partiallyfunded from a 1.5 percent levyimposed on TV, cinema andfilm operators. Every timesomeone goes to see a film inthe cinema in Poland, part of

David Ingham

Agnieszka Holland

After graduating from filmschool in Prague in 1971, War-saw-born director AgnieszkaHolland started work as anassistant producer beforegoing on to direct her first fea-

ture film, “Aktorzy Prow-incjonalni” (“Provincial Ac-tors”), in 1978. Her majorinternational breakthroughcame when she directed theWest German film “AngryHarvest,” which was nominat-ed for the Academy Award forBest Foreign Language Filmin 1985. Ms Holland has sub-sequently directed numerousother German, British and USproductions, including 1993’scritically-acclaimed movie“The Secret Garden.” ●

CO

UR

TE

SY O

F S

ON

Y P

ICT

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ES

CL

AS

SIC

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“In Darkness” has been nominated for this year’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar

“It won’t only beTinsel Town

celebrating to thesound of poppingchampagne corks”

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 COVER STORY www.wbj.pl 13

Two key roads

not finished

for Euro 2012

Poland’s Transport

Minister said last

Thursday that two

important roads

scheduled to be opened

in time for the Euro 2012

soccer championship,

which kicks off in June,

will not be completed

according to schedule.

“It gives me no

satisfaction to say that

we will most likely not

be able to drive through

the entire A1 and A4

highway for the Euro,”

Minister S∏awomir

Nowak told journalists.

When completed the A1,

which runs north-south,

will connect Gdaƒsk on

the Baltic Sea to the

Polish-Czech border.

Highway A4 is meant to

connect Poland with

Germany in the west and

with Ukraine in the east.

FDI

projects up

The Polish Information

and Foreign Investment

Agency (PAIiIZ) is

currently running 154

foreign direct

investment (FDI)

projects jointly worth

€5.6 billion. That’s 10

more investments than

in the same period last

year. The largest

number of projects

originate in the US (43

projects worth €1.33

billion) followed by the

UK (17 projects worth

€316 million), Germany,

China, Japan, France

and South Korea. The

largest number of

investments (30)

concern the BPO sector,

closely followed by the

automotive sector (29).

However projects in the

automotive sector are

worth €1.86 billion,

while those in the BPO

sector are worth €33

million. ●

the money they spend onthe ticket goes into futuredomestic film projects.

In terms of assessing thesuccess of the new system,the change in the numberof Poles who watch domes-tic films may serve as adecent barometer.

“In 2005, 800,000 Poleswent to the cinema to seePolish-language films, butin 2011, 11,800,000 Polessaw Polish films,” Ms Bez said.

Last year, the Polishromantic comedy “Listy doM” (“Letters to Santa”), tooktop spot at the box office,drawing in 2.33 million view-ers, followed by “Och KarolII,” which was seen by 1.75million cinema-goers.

However, due to obviouslanguage barriers that exist,the majority of Polish-lan-guage films still struggle tomake waves internationally,which is why Poland’s bestoption may be to attract for-eign producers to come andmake movies here, throughfocusing on improving theavailable facilities and expert-ise.

Location,location, location“Internationally, Poland is notknown as a film location. It is,however, a low-cost countrywith highly skilled workers,and today a lot of the uncer-tainty that existed in terms ofinfrastructure and services 10to 15 years ago has disap-peared, so the time is nowright,” Jacek Levernes, vicepresident of HP Global Busi-ness Services in Europe toldWBJ.

Mr Levernes feels thatPoland has the potential to bea center for European filmproduction, but that a com-bined effort to promote thecountry as a great movie loca-tion is the only way to take theindustry on to the next level.

¸ódê is one obvious exam-ple of a great location for filmproduction in Poland. The city,which was once a center fortextile production, has a longtradition of movie making,with three of Poland’s mostfamous directors of all time,Andrzej Wajda, Krzysztof

KieÊlowski and Roman Polan-ski, all having studied at thefamous Leon Schiller NationalHigher School of Film, Televi-sion and Theatre in ¸ódê.

The presence of numerousfilmmaking professionals andnew production facilities, aswell as industrial architecturewhich is perfect for shootinghistorical movies, has made¸ódê into something of a cine-ma city in Poland, and helpedto revive an area that couldhave slipped into depressionfollowing the closure ofnumerous factories in recenttimes.

In addition to recent devel-opments in ̧ ódê, new facilitiesspecifically dedicated to filmproduction and post-produc-tion have also emerged inother parts of Poland since2005. Alvernia Studios, a mod-ern film studio based inKraków and The ChimneyPot, a post-production facilityin Warsaw that specializes indigital intermediate technolo-gy and special effects, are twosuch examples.

Each region in Poland canalso offer assistance to film-makers by providing fundingfor projects from regional filmfunds. In recent years the twofunds with the largest annualbudgets were The Lower Sile-sian Film Competition, whichhad a budget of z∏.1.6 millionfor film projects in 2011, andthe Regional Film FundKraków, whose annual budgetfor film production has stoodat z∏.1.35 million.

The main stipulation forgaining funding in a particularregion is that the film in ques-tion must have some form ofconnection to the local area orto Poland, either in terms ofbeing shot on location or beingmade as a co-production

between Polish andforeign filmmakers.

Wasted potential?Given the facilitiesand expertise avail-able, the questionremains: is enoughbeing done to maxi-mize Poland’s poten-tial?

According to HP’sJacek Lavernes, more

could be done. He believes thebest way to promote Polandwould be a major collabora-tion between film and non-film organizations, somethingwhich he says is not happeningat the moment.

“My suggestion would beto create a coalition of compa-nies which are active in thePolish film industry, along withthe Polish Information andForeign Investment Agencyand the Economy Ministry, aswell as film ambassadors suchas directors, actors and otherfilm professionals, to promotePolish film. A little effort canmake a huge impact, ” he said.

However, there may be oneother stumbling block toattracting foreign producers –taxes.

“Considering the placeswhere you can shoot films,we have excellent locations.But the problem is that inPoland we have very hightaxes on film production, sothat doesn’t attract foreignfilm producers. The onlysolution would be to reducethe taxes on film produc-tion,” Ms Bez said.

Yet since the Polish FilmInstitute started life in 2005,the amount of foreign co-productions with the partici-pation of Polish filmmakershas risen each year, whichsuggests that despite thedrawbacks, things are movingin the right direction.

But whatever the futureholds for the country’s filmindustry, one thing is certain:success helps breed success,so the more awards andinternational recognitionPolish-made films receive,the greater the chancePoland’s movie industry hasof making a big impact in thefuture. ●

Krzysztof KieÊlowski

After finally being acceptedby the ¸ódê Film Schoolupon his third application,Krzysztof KieÊlowski went onto gain international fame forboth his documentary andfeature film productions.Arguably his most famous

body of work was the trilogyof films “Three Colors: Blue,”“Three Colors: White” and“Three Colors: Red,” whichexplored the ideals of theFrench Revolution: liberty,equality, and fraternity. Thefinal film in the trilogy saw MrKieÊlowski nominated for theBest Director Oscar, as wellas Best Screenplay in collab-oration with Krzysztof Pie-siewicz. This was to be hisfinal fully completed proj-ect, as he died two yearsafter its 1994 release, at theage of 54. ●

Roman Polaƒski

Roman Polaƒski is without adoubt the most internation-ally well-known Polish direc-tor of all time. His numerousfilm credits include “Rose-mary’s Baby,” “Chinatown,”“The Ninth Gate” and the“The Pianist,” the latter ofwhich tells the true story ofPolish pianist W∏adys∏aw

Szpilman and his survivalduring World War II. Thefilm won Oscars for BestDirector and Best Film aswell as the Palme d’Or at the2002 Cannes Film Festival.However, Mr Polanski is nostranger to controversy andtragedy. In 1969, while hewas away filming, his then-wife, Sharon Tate, was mur-dered at his Hollywoodhome along with four otherpeople, by members of theManson family. Then, in1977, he was convicted ofhaving sex with a minor, butavoided sentencing by flee-ing abroad. ●

Andrzej Wajda

The 85-year-old Oscar-win-ning filmmaker is revered asa master of his art, both athome and abroad. He beganhis movie-making career with1955’s “A generation,” whichwent on to form part of a tril-ogy of war films that also

included “Kana∏” in 1956 and“Ashes and Diamonds” twoyears later. His movie “Manof Iron” won the covetedPalme d’Or award at the 1981Cannes Film Festival. Butdespite garnering four Acad-emy Award nominations intotal, his only triumph atthose awards was an hon-orary Oscar in 2000. He iscurrently working on his lat-est film, “Wa∏´sa,” which tellsthe story of legendary Soli-darity trade union activistand former President ofPoland Lech Wa∏´sa. ●

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“Polish-language films stillstruggle to make waves

internationally, which is whyPoland’s best option may beto attract foreign producers”

Combining the most in-depth social media knowledge with the sophisticated insights of consumer behavior

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LOKALE IMMOBILIAW a r s a w B u s i n e s s J o u r n a l ’s w e e k l y s u p p l e m e n t o n r e a l e s t a t e , c o n s t r u c t i o n a n d d e v e l o p m e n t • FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012, LI 17/06

Vantage

prepares to

enter WSE

Wroc∏aw-based

developer Vantage

Development has issued

its prospectus and

expects to debut on the

Warsaw Stock Exchange

at the turn of March and

April this year. The public

offering will be targeted

at the shareholders of

Impel, which, along with

the two founders and

main shareholders of

Grupa Impel, is a

shareholder in Vantage

Development. In return

for the move, Impel will

shift its remaining

development activity,

carried out by Zak∏ad

Ecoimpel, to Vantage

Development. The

operation is expected to

strengthen the

organizational structure

and efficiency of both

entities.

BRE Bank

in Senator

BRE Bank is the latest

tenant in the under-

construction Senator

office project in

Warsaw. The company

has taken up 1,665 sqm

of space in the scheme.

Located on Warsaw’s ul.

Bielaƒska, the Senator

investment will

comprise more than

24,500 sqm of office

space on six floors. The

project, which is being

developed by Ghelamco

Poland, is scheduled to

be completed in the

middle of this year. ●

Hines in Kraków . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Galeria Neptun . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Retail investment . . . . . . . . . . .15

Warsaw Business Centre . . . . .16

Warehouse demand . . . . . . . . .16

Property-related stocks . . . . . .16

Włodarzewska IPO . . . . . . . . . .17

Record transactions . . . . . . . . .17

In this issue

1716

Small cities are increasingtheir share of Poland’s retailinvestments

Ahead of its IPO, W∏odarzewskais touting its strategy ofinvestment diversity

The ApartamentyNovum developmentrepresents thebeginning of thecompany’s long-terminvolvement in the city

Developer Hines Polska haslaunched construction on itsApartamenty Novum multi-family residential project inKraków, the company’s firstinvestment in the southern Pol-ish city. The development,which will be built by Erbud, isscheduled to be completed bythe end of 2013.

The Apartamenty Novuminvestment will sit on 4.8hectares of land located onKraków’s ul. Rakowicka. Theplot was bought by a Hines sub-sidiary and the Heitman invest-ment fund in October 2010.

“We made the first attemptto buy land for an investment inKraków as early as 2005,” Woj-ciech Rumian, Hines’s manag-

ing director for developmentprojects in Poland, said in astatement.

He added that the companywas intent on finding a centrallylocated plot on which it couldconstruct a sufficiently largebuilding. He pointed out thatthis is very difficult to achieve inKraków.

“We view the launch of con-struction on ApartamentyNovum on ul. Rakowicka notonly as the end of the search,but also as the beginning ofHines’s longer involvement inthe Kraków market and thewillingness to develop moreinvestments [there],” Mr Rumi-an said.

The Apartamenty Novumproject was designed by theIMB Asymetria architecturalstudio. It will comprise over 400apartments and parking spacesfor 458 cars. The units in thescheme are priced from z∏.7,800per sqm.

Adam Zdrodowski

Shopping centers

Building work soon to launch on Galeria NeptunThe mall is expectedto be completed inearly 2014

Construction on the GaleriaNeptun shopping center inStarogard Gdaƒski, in Poland’snorthern Pomorskie voivod-ship, will soon begin now thatthe development has obtained abuilding permit.

Construction is due tolaunch in April, Cushman &Wakefield said in a statement.The firm is both an advisor tothe developer and the exclusiveagent responsible for the com-mercialization of the scheme.Completion is expected inspring of 2014.

“Galeria Neptun is the firstsuch large-scale development inStarogard Gdaƒski. The build-ing permit now allows us tocarry on working on this proj-

ect,” Tomasz Daniecki, head ofproject management at Cush-man & Wakefield, said in astatement.

Galeria Neptun, which isbeing developed by an epony-mous company, will be locatedat the site of a former footwearfactory at the junction of ul.Pomorska and Al. Jana Paw∏a IIin the downtown area ofStarogard Gdaƒski.

The two-storey scheme willprovide 25,000 sqm of leasablespace and an undergroundparking lot with spaces for 618vehicles.

Cushman & Wakefield hasbeen charged with preparing anapplication to have the localzoning plan amended, to devel-op a concept for the buildingand its vicinity, and to prepare acomprehensive building permitdesign for the scheme. GP

Residential

Hines Polska enters Kraków market

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The shopping center will boast 25,000 sqm of leasable space

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Warsaw Business Journal presents Real Estate weekly newsletter

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or

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012LOKALE IMMOBILIA – REAL ESTATE16

GTC

renegotiates

loan conditions

Warsaw Stock Exchange-

listed developer Globe

Trade Centre (GTC) has

renegotiated project

finance loans worth a

total of €97 million. The

loans have been

reclassified as long-term

liabilities, which is

expected to improve the

company’s cash-flow

profile.

Erbud

commissions

in Wroc∏aw,

Gdaƒsk

Construction company

Erbud will be the general

contractor of a complex of

multi-family residential

buildings in Wroc∏aw that

will be developed by LC

Corp. The value of the

agreement amounts to

z∏.24.2 million, with

construction scheduled to

launch this month and

finish in September 2013.

Erbud has also recently

been selected by Alfa

Investments as the general

contractor of an office

project in Gdaƒsk. The

value of the deal amounts

to z∏.27.6 million. ●

Security Closing % change 52-week 52-week % change Total Marketprice (week) low high (year) shares value

on Feb 9 (z∏. mln)

BUDIMEX 85.20 0.83 62.00 109.70 -12 25,530,098 2,175.16

CELTIC 17.69 2.25 15.35 25.88 -6 34,068,252 602.67

DOMDEV 38.50 13.40 23.50 51.90 -21 24,560,222 945.57

ECHO 3.91 -2.01 3.05 5.60 -9 420,000,000 1,642.20

ELBUDOWA 103.00 3.00 82.25 170.00 -39 4,747,608 489.00

ENERGOPLD 2.30 15.00 1.78 4.15 -39 70,972,001 163.24

ERBUD 22.00 8.64 14.65 50.75 -57 12,644,169 278.17

GANT 9.16 8.66 5.85 16.98 -44 20,499,953 187.78

GTC 10.83 6.91 7.91 21.79 -49 219,372,990 2,375.81

HBPOLSKA 1.18 10.28 0.66 2.79 -55 210,558,445 248.46

JWCONSTR 7.07 -4.85 4.33 15.55 -49 54,073,280 382.30

LCCORP 1.24 7.83 0.81 1.71 -17 447,558,311 554.97

MARVIPOL 9.86 1.34 6.70 10.10 6 36,923,400 364.06

MIRBUD 2.47 3.35 1.87 4.85 -43 75,000,000 185.25

MOSTALWAR 20.55 1.99 15.40 49.00 -58 20,000,000 411.00

MOSTALZAB 1.68 2.44 0.99 3.08 -40 149,130,538 250.54

ORCOGROUP 17.85 -1.05 13.30 42.38 -46 17,053,866 304.41

PBG 79.05 -3.36 53.70 205.00 -60 14,295,000 1,130.02

PLAZACNTR 2.65 9.96 1.71 5.15 -36 297,174,515 787.51

POLAQUA 7.15 3.17 4.37 20.60 -65 27,500,100 196.63

POLIMEXMS 1.96 5.38 1.19 3.78 -46 521,154,076 1,021.46

POLNORD 18.05 5.49 11.00 34.00 -44 23,798,439 429.56

RANKPROGR 13.18 9.92 8.10 14.45 30 37,145,050 489.57

ROBYG 1.33 3.10 1.02 2.14 -28 257,390,000 342.33

RONSON 0.90 0.00 0.77 1.61 -37 272,360,000 245.12

TRAKCJA 1.26 0.80 0.63 4.05 -65 232,105,480 292.45

ULMA 59.60 4.10 53.00 88.00 -24 5,255,632 313.24

UNIBEP 5.78 -5.86 4.00 9.80 -40 33,927,184 196.10

WARIMPEX 4.55 1.34 2.92 10.96 -56 54,000,000 245.70

ZUE 8.50 6.92 5.02 14.20 -39 22,000,000 187.00

Property-related stocks

www.wbj.pl

Shopping centers

Small cities continue to attract retail investmentsUrban centers withpopulations below100,000 will accountfor over one-third ofthe 2012 supply

Small Polish cities are continu-ing to attract new retail devel-opments, with urban centersthat have populations of below100,000 expected to account forapproximately 36 percent ofthis year’s total shopping centersupply.

Karina Kreja, an associatedirector at the research andconsultancy department ofCBRE, said that small, medi-um-sized and large cities willsee a comparable proportion ofdeliveries to one another in

2012, but noted that it isschemes in the small cities thatare now setting a trend.

“Until 2007, the eight largestcities in Poland accounted forover 50 percent of the totalshopping center supply,” MsKreja said, adding that smallcities have accounted for one-third of the market for the lasttwo to three years. “This trendis expected to continue this andnext year.”

When one takes into consid-eration all retail space currentlyunder construction in Poland,which totals more than 700,000sqm, the small cities’ share ofthe market actually looks evenmore impressive, and stands atapproximately 45 percent,according to Savills data.

“In small cities with popula-tions of less than 100,000 thecompetition is small or evendoes not exist at all, while thelevel of the inhabitants’ afflu-ence is often not different fromthat in large cities,” said Wiole-ta Wojtczak, a senior consultantat the research and consultancydepartment of Savills Polska.

She added that in the case ofsmall cities, developers ofteninvest on a “first-come, first-served” basis and that a singlenew scheme has the ability tochange the dynamics of a localmarket considerably, makingthe development of other proj-ects much riskier.

The largest shopping cen-

ters that are scheduled to becompleted in Poland’s smallcities this year include KrosnoCenter in Krosno, Alfa Cen-trum in Grudziàdz, GaleriaOlimpia in Be∏chatów, Odrza-ƒskie Ogrody in K´dzierzynKoêle and Galeria Veneda in¸om˝a.

Adam Zdrodowski

Small but mightyMajor shopping centers scheduled for completion in small Polish cities in 2012

City Project GLA (sqm) Developer

Krosno Krosno Center 30,000 Karpackie Centrum Obs∏ugi Inwestycji

Grudziàdz Alfa Centrum 22,000 JWK Invest

Be∏chatów Galeria Olimpia 21,050 Echo Investment

K´dzierzyn-Koêle Odrzƒskie Ogrody 21,000 PA Nova

¸om˝a Galeria Veneda 16,200 Echo Investment

S∏upsk Jantar 15,500 Mayland Real Estate

Source: Emmerson

Office investors team up to buildintegrated business center in Warsaw

one of the hottest locations onWarsaw’s office map.

In spite of their differentoffice space offers, the part-ners aim to make WBC anintegrated business centeroffering tenants coordinatedservices and facilities. Bo-les∏aw Shugol, a representa-tive for Concept Tower,described the scheme asunique in Warsaw and pointedout that it will entail consider-able financial benefits for theparties involved.

Cooperation between theinvestors is already underwayas far as the development of

the local roadinfrastructure isconcerned. In thefuture, the in-vestors’ officebuildings are sup-posed to benefitfrom, among oth-er things, a jointpurchase of utili-ties (maintenancesavings estimatedat from 20-30 per-cent), and cen-trally managedparking and secu-rity systems.

AZ

Logistics

Leasing activity growsin Poland’s logistics marketDespite forecasts of aneconomic slowdown,strong demand forwarehouse space isexpected this year

Due to the strength of the Pol-ish economy, demand formodern warehouse space inthe country is continuing togrow, according to a report byCBRE.

Total leasing activity in2011 grew by about 30 percentyear-on-year, with over 1.86million sqm of space leasedout. Tenants from the logisticsand manufacturing sectorswere the most active, withthese being represented main-ly by producers of automotiveand construction materials.

Sector III, which compriseslogistics parks located in allPolish regions excluding War-

saw, saw over 60 percent of2011 leasing activity, with333,000 sqm and 250,000 sqmleased out in the Silesia andWroc∏aw regions respectively.

Meanwhile, vacancy ratesfell last year to stand at 10percent for the whole ofPoland. In Warsaw, thevacancy rate was at 9 percent.

As with leasing activity,total completions of newleasable warehouse spacegrew by 30 percent y/y tostand at 350,000 sqm, includ-ing about 100,000 sqm inSilesia. Roughly 40 percentof logistics projects in 2011were constructed on a built-to-suit basis. Developerslaunched construction onaround 600,000 sqm ofspace.

Looking at this year,CBRE expects leasing activi-ty to be at least as high as it

was in 2011, although muchdepends on the overallhealth of the economy.

“Although economic fore-casts are worse for this yearthan last, occupiers anddevelopers don’t seem tomind and construction activ-ity is at a higher level thanlast year,” Joanna Mroczek,director of Research & Con-sultancy at CBRE in Polandtold Lokale Immobilia.

Ms Mroczek said thatjudging by the level ofinquiries she has observed,demand for warehouse spacecan be expected to be as highor higher than it was lastyear, although a lot dependson how the retail marketperforms and on the comple-tion of highways, since thesefactors are major generatorsof demand.

Gareth Price

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The development will be located in

Warsaw’s Wola district

Developer Concept Develop-ment last week announced thelaunch of Warsaw BusinessCentre (WBC), an initiativethat envisions the creation ofan integrated business centerin the area of ul. Grzybowska,ul. Karolkowa, ul. Hrubies-zowska and ul. Przyokopowa

in the capital’s Wola district.Concept Development, as

well as three other investorsinvolved in the WBC concept– Ablon Group, Polstar Invest-ment and LC Corp, are all cur-rently developing or planningoffice projects in the area,which has recently become

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FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 LOKALE IMMOBILIA – REAL ESTATE www.wbj.pl 17

Developers

W∏odarzewska plans new commercial investments, IPOThe company is in theprocess of diversifyingits developmentactivity

Warsaw-based developer W∏o-darzewska, which has mostlybuilt housing projects locatedin and around the Polish capi-tal, plans to launch severalcommercial investments in thenear future.

The company, which isalready developing a retailscheme in Brwinów near War-saw, is working on severalother shopping center proj-ects, as well as a retail parkdevelopment, whose detailshave so far not been revealed.

An office building locatedin Warsaw’s Ursynów districtwill likely be the first of theplanned commercial invest-ments to be launched by W∏o-darzewska. The company

plans to commence construc-tion on the 11-floor scheme onthe capital’s ul. Jastrz´bow-skiego in the second quarter ofthis year.

“We are developing anddiversifying our activity, hencethe presence in our portfolioof Galeria Brwinów and theplans related to new shoppingcenters and a retail park,” saidJerzy Szymaƒski, president ofW∏odarzewska’s managementboard.

He added that the compa-ny’s land bank currently com-prises 250 hectares of land,most of which is earmarkedfor the development of com-mercial space. New residentialprojects will be built in, amongother locations, Warsaw’sUrsynów and Ochota districts.

A mixed-use skyscraper incentral Warsaw that is current-ly at an early design stage is

arguably W∏odarzewska’smost spectacular plannedinvestment. The tower willcomprise both residential andoffice space.

“We are an investor that ismostly active in the Warsawmarket and this is why we areinterested in the developmentof very different projects inthis area,” Mr Szymaƒski said.

He added that W∏o-darzewska’s business modeldemands that it operate inmany sectors of the market.

In Q3 2012, W∏odarzewska,already present on the Cata-lyst bond market, plans todebut on the Warsaw StockExchange. “We are preparingfor the process and will makethe final decision, taking fac-tors related to the market situ-ation into consideration,” MrSzymaƒski said.

Adam Zdrodowski

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Company president Jerzy Szymaƒski

Over €2.5 billion in deals last year – the most since 2007Transactions worth more than€2.5 billion were carried outacross all real estate sectors inPoland last year, making 2011the strongest year for transac-tions since 2007, according toa recent study by Jones LangLaSalle. The amount repre-sents an annualized increase

of 28 percent and is overthree-and-a-half times thelevel observed in 2009.

A breakdown of the 2011figure shows that over €1.15billion was spent on office-market transactions (the high-est since 2006), over €1.2 bil-lion on retail deals, over €100

million in the industrial sectorand around €76 million in thehotel sector.

The four largest officetransactions involved NorthGate, Focus, Park Post´pu andMiasteczko Orange. Com-bined, these accounted forover 40 percent of the office

transaction volume. Only oneoffice investment transaction –the sale of Green Office inKraków to Azora – took placeoutside of Warsaw last year.

Retail investment volumeswere at highs unseen since2007, with the top three trans-actions accounting for around

53 percent of the total volume. Looking ahead, the total

investment volume in 2012could be at a similar level tolast year’s, due to positiveinvestor sentiment and a goodeconomic outlook for Poland,the report says.

Gareth Price

Best Western

opens Polish

office

The first Polish office of

the Best Western hotel

chain has opened in the

Skylight Building office

project in central

Warsaw. This brings the

number of Best Western

hotels in Poland to 11.

The company plans to

open a further nine by

the end of 2012. “Last

year we doubled the

number of Best Western

brand facilities. This

year, we are also

planning an intensive

development of our

portfolio,” Gheorghe

Cristescu, regional sales

director at Best Western

in Poland, said in a

statement.

Lipiƒski

Passage 50%

leased outCorporate finance

advisor and direct

investment company

Vienna Capital Partners

has leased 326 sqm of

office space in the

Lipiƒski Passage mixed-

use project in Warsaw.

The company is expected

to move into the property

later this month. ●

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012THE LIST18 www.wbj.pl

Travel & Leisure

Travel Management CompaniesRanked by plane tickets issued in 2010 www.bookoflists.pl

Notes: NR = Not Ranked, WND = Would Not Disclose. Research for theList was done in January 2012. Number of employees and ownership struc-ture are as of December 2011. All information pertains to the companies’activities in Poland.

To the best of WBJ ’s knowledge, the information is accurate as of press time. While every effort is made to ensure accuracy and thoroughness, omissions and typographicalerrors may occur. Corrections or additions to The List should be sent, on official letterhead, to Warsaw Business Journal, attn. Joanna Raszka, ul. Elblàska 15/17, 01-747 Warsaw,via fax to (+48) 22 639-8569, or via e-mail to wbjbol@wbj.pl. Copyright 2011, Valkea Media SA. The List may not be reprinted or reproduced in whole or in part without priorwritten permission of the publisher. Reprints are available.

Rank

Company nameAddressTel./FaxE-mailWeb page

Number oftickets issued

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Total revenue(z∏. mln)

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in P

ola

nd /

N

um

ber

of

TM

Cem

plo

yees

in P

ola

nd

Tota

l num

ber

of

em

plo

yees

in P

ola

nd /

Year

founded in P

ola

nd /

Year

IATA

lic

ense

obta

ined

Ownership: Polish /Foreign

Top local executive /

Title

1

Carlson Wagonlit Travel Sp. z o.o.ul. Tamka 38, 00-355 Warsaw22 556-2200/22 556-2299cwt@carlsonwagonlit.plwww.carlsonwagonlit.pl

68,326122,743109,185126,628

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Creation and management ofbusiness trip programs;expense analysis andoptimization; delivery

negotiation; rail tickets inPoland and abroad; fair tickets

Carlson WagonlitTravel

7131

13119191947

Carlson Wagonlit Polska Compagne Internationale

Wagonlit Travel

Pawe∏ RekGeneral Director

2

American Express Travel SAul. Ch∏odna 51, 00-867 Warsaw22 581-5100/22 654-7040warsawbtc@aexp.comwww.americanexpress.pl

47,07486,32466,74387,000

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

According to individual needsof customer; optimization ofbusiness travel management

American Express 286

8619921992

WNDWestyna Kulczycka

General Director

3

Weco Travel Sp. z o.o.ul. TaÊmowa 7, 02-677 Warsaw22 520-2800/22 520-2886info@weco.com.plwww.weco.pl

47,46678,09968,95469,893

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓-✓

Hotel reservations; traintickets; congresses;

conferences; incentive trips(MICE); car rentals; visas

Radius - The globaltravel management

4WND

8719921992

NoneWeco - Travel CEE - 80%;

JJ Singh - 20%

JJ Singh CEO

4

Fly Away Travel Sp. z o.o.ul. Po∏czyƒska 31A, 01-377 Warsaw22 478-6333/22 478-6399flycenter@flyaway.plwww.flyaway.pl

WND59,28755,31471,625

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Comprehensive corporatetravel management; the

lowest ticket pricepreference; help desk 24/7;

train ticket reservation systemin all branches; Rail Europe;

free tests

-558

7119901990

WNDNone

Bart∏omiej BudzyƒskiDirector, Board Member

5

Bankowe Biuro Podró˝yTRAVELBANK Sp. z o.o.ul. Waliców 11, 00-851 Warsaw22 654-3525/22 654-6650info@travelbank.com.plwww.travelbank.com.pl

56,50052,30039,60034,200

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Air Cargo; complex businesstrip service; sale of holidaycatalogs; incentive travel;

tourist vouchers

Global MarketSpecialists

145

WND19911991

WNDNone

Wanda KonopkaPresident

6

Netmedia Business Travel Sp. z o.o.ul. D∏uga 44/50, 00-241 Warsaw22 314-7200/22 314-7205handlowy@nbt.plwww.nbt.pl

26,62548,23346,00043,500

35.070.763.061.0

59.0113.0115.0102.0

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Outbound and inboundtourism

Lufthansa City Center;EGENCIA

347

18019851990

Netmedia - 100%None

Marian Szypu∏aPresident

7

Centrum Podró˝y Air ClubStanis∏aw Modliƒskiul. Senatorska 28, 00-095 Warsaw22 829-9500/22 829-9550info@airclub.plwww.airclub.pl

25,65748,20542,19153,719

40.874.765.282.1

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Individual tourism; Club Medtrips; incentive parties;

congresses; train tickets;buses; ferries; cruises

BCD Travel114

9119901990

Stanis∏aw Modliƒski -100%None

Stanis∏aw ModliƒskiPresident

8

Blue Sky Travel Sp. z o.o.ul. Roosevelta 2, 60-829 Poznaƒ61 841-0900/61 842-0343office@bluesky.plwww.bluesky.pl

27,86335,20929,84826,866

3.86.32.33.9

7.013.412.422.8

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

WND -320

5519901992

Jerzy Ruszkowski -60.1%; Jerzy and EwaRuszkowscy - 39.9%

None

Jerzy RuszkowskiPresident

9

FCm Travel ExpressAl. Jana Paw∏a II 19, 00-854 Warsaw22 453-5353/22 453-5301travel@pl.fcm.travelwww.fcmtravel.pl

16,00027,00021,00023,000

WNDWNDWNDWND

35.063.052.060.0

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

VIP service; customized travelmanagement reporting andanalysis; cost optimization

FCm Travel Solutions140

4019941995

WNDTim Hyland

President

10

Supertour Lufthansa City Centerul. Niemcewicza 26, 02-306 Warsaw22 556-6300/22 556-6310super@supertour.plwww.supertour.pl

14,10023,00022,00029,500

23.335.036.043.0

35.056.050.061.0

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Business trip management;cost optimization according toreports and analysis; internaltraining sessions; external

training sessions; seminars;account manager protection

Business PlusLuthansa City Center,Luthansa City Center

430

5019901993

Bogdan Wieczorek;Wojciech Wojdat

WND

Bogdan WieczorekPresident

11

Mazurkas Travel Biuro Podró˝y Sp. z o.o.ul. Wojska Polskiego 27, 01-515 Warsaw22 536-4600/22 839-2090mazurkas@mazurkas.com.plwww.mazurkas.com.pl

5,6004,300WND2,800

3.93.0

WND1.9

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

-✓✓

✓✓-

--✓

WND -WNDWND

WND19901993

Andrzej Bartkowski -50%; Andrzej Hulewicz -

50%None

Andrzej HulewiczVice President

12

Biuro Podró˝ników Flugo Sp. z o.o.ul. Marii Sk∏odowskiej-Curie 10,85-094 Bydgoszcz52 340-0416/52 341-7505andreo@flugo.com.plwww.flugo.com.pl

2,3723,7633,9963,974

3.65.05.15.4

7.913.59.212.0

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

Ski conferences; product-launch trips; reference visit;

organizing events; touroperator service; ferries;

cruises

Alians Polska SieçBiur Podró˝y

111

1119981998

Andreo Grz´bowski -60%; Micha∏ Brzozowski -20%; Cezary Wilemajtys -

20%None

Andreo Grz´bowski President

NR

Olimp Air Biuro Podró˝y Sp. z o.o.ul. ¸owicka 23, 02-502 Warsaw22 549-6950/22 549-6956olimpair@olimpair.com.plwww.olimpair.com.pl

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

WNDWNDWNDWND

✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

✓✓✓

VIP service; individual luxurytrips; product launches;

cruises; private and familyevents

-18

819901995

WNDAndrzej Górski

President

1st half of 2011 / 2010 / 2009 / 2008

Corporate services

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012MARKETS20 www.wbj.pl

SO

UR

CE

: W

SE

PLN-EUR

4.19

32

4.18

37

4.18

18

4.17

10

4.17

69

4.20

48

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

24.00

4.25

4.50 PLN-USD

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

2

3.18

48

3.20

84

3.18

06

3.14

61

3.14

87

3.17

03

3.0

3.5 PLN-GBP

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

2

5.04

69

5.04

94

5.03

38

5.00

60

4.98

79

5.02

16

4.5

5.5 PLN-CHF

3.47

84

3

.469

5

3.4

633

3.44

31

3.45

07

3

.475

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

23.3

3.5 PLN-RUB

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

2

0.10

54

0.10

59

0.10

60

0.10

56

0.10

57

0.10

60

0.10

0.12 PLN-100JPY

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

10.0

2

4.17

92

4.18

31

4.14

39

4.08

16

4.07

92

4.08

07

4

5

currency rates

Greece weighs

on the z∏oty

Currency report

The anticipated correctivemovement on the z∏oty final-ly materialized last week.Markets started off the weekcontinuing the previousweeks’ trend, with the z∏otyreaching weekly lows atz∏.4.15 against the euro andz∏.3.12 against the dollar.One of the drivers of thosemoves was the EUR/USD,which climbed to a three-month high of $1.33 decreas-ing risk aversion.

Hopes for a furtherappreciation of the z∏otyarose after the NationalBank of Poland’s MonetaryPolicy Council (RPP) keptinterest rates unchanged at4.5 percent, but at the sametime warned that high infla-tion (which has remainedabove 4 percent) could resultin an interest-rate hike.

However, the situationchanged mid-week when

Greece was told to meetadditional restrictions inorder to receive a secondround of financial aid.

The factor that sped upthe z∏oty’s depreciation lastweek was Friday’s statementby George Karatzaferis,leader of the Greek right-wing party LAOS, who saidthat he could not vote infavor of the new rescue plan.The LAOS party has only 15seats out of the total 300 inthe Greek parliament (whichmeans it cannot block thenew plan by itself), but themarkets reacted nervously,with the EUR/USD declin-ing rapidly to $1.32.

Emerging markets cur-rencies reacted even morestrongly – the EUR/PLNclimbed all the way to z∏.4.21,the USD/PLN advanced toz∏.3.19 while the CHF/PLNrose to z∏.3.48. ●

Adam Narczewski, X-Trade Brokers DM SA

SO

UR

CE

: N

BP

Major indices

Top 5 Closing % change (week) 52-week high 52-week low

HERMAN 5.95 153.19 5.95 0.45EUROMARK 2.20 109.52 4.96 1.00KOMPUTRON 10.55 49.65 10.95 3.66INTERSPPL 2.97 35.62 4.60 1.33STAPORKOW 24.97 34.32 27.00 10.45

WIG 41,792.46 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: 0.46% 52-week high: 50,371.74

Change year to February 9: 9.07% 52-week low: 36,549.47

Top 5 Closing % change (week) 52-week high 52-week low

GTC 10.83 6.91 21.79 7.86POLIMEXMS 1.96 5.38 3.71 1.30TVN 11.80 5.17 18.50 8.96LOTOS 27.55 5.15 49.42 21.45CYFRPOLSAT 14.40 5.11 17.25 12.70

Bottom 5 Closing % change (week) 52-week high 52-week low

ONE2ONE 2.70 -17.18 7.29 2.04MIDAS 1.14 -15.56 1.15 1.10EUIMPLANT 0.24 -14.29 0.60 0.19EDINVEST 3.62 -13.81 6.93 2.50EUROHOLD 2.50 -13.79 3.50 2.50

Bottom 5 Closing % change (week) 52-week high 52-week low

GETIN 2.39 -4.78 15.29 2.39PBG 79.05 -3.36 204.00 58.90PKN ORLEN 37.70 -3.03 57.90 32.30TPSA 16.78 -2.39 18.90 15.10PGNIG 3.69 -2.38 4.64 3.60

WIG20 2,364.29 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: -0.29% 52-week high: 2,932.62

Change year to February 9: 7.76% 52-week low: 2,089.84

mWIG40 2,421.55 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: 1.45% 52-week high: 2,987.72

Change year to February 9: 10.56% 52-week low: 2,076.52

sWIG80 9,874.29 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: 3.27% 52-week high: 12,932.00

Change year to February 9: 14.76% 52-week low: 8,218.71

NewConnect 43.01 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: 3.31% 52-week high: 59.56

Change year to February 9: 3.66% 52-week low: 41.49

WIG-Banki 6,086.84 (February 9 close)

Change for the week: -0.11% 52-week high: 7,387.49

Change year to February 9: 9.81% 52-week low: 4,944.19

DJIA12,890.46 (Feb 9 close)

1.46% (for the week)

CHANGE: 3.98%

(year to Feb 9 close)

52-week high: 12,978.20

52-week low: 10,362.30

NASDAQ2,927.23 (Feb 9 close)

2.36% (for the week)

CHANGE: 10.51%

(year to Feb 9)

52-week high: 2,930.68

52-week low: 2,298.89

S&P5001,351.95 (Feb 9 close)

1.99% (for the week)

CHANGE: 5.86%

(year to Feb 9)

52-week high: 1,370.58

52-week low: 1,074.77

FTSE1005,895.50 (Feb 9 close)

1.71% (for the week)

CHANGE: 3.43%

(year to Feb 9)

52-week high: 6,105.80

52-week low: 4,791.01

DAX6,788.80 (Feb 9 close)

2.00% (for the week)

CHANGE: 11.74%

(year to Feb 9)

52-week high: 7,600.41

52-week low: 4,965.80

NIKKEI2259,002.24 (Feb 9 close)

1.41% (for the week)

CHANGE: 5.17%

(year to Feb 9 )

52-week high: 10,891.60

52-week low: 8,227.63

world stock indices

37,000

38,600

40,200

41,800

43,400

45,000

13.0

1

16.0

1

17.0

1

18.0

1

19.0

1

20.0

1

23.0

1

24.0

1

25.0

1

26.0

1

27.0

1

30.0

1

31.0

1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

2,100

2,200

2,300

2,400

2,500

2,60013

.01

16.0

1

17.0

1

18.0

1

19.0

1

20.0

1

23.0

1

24.0

1

25.0

1

26.0

1

27.0

1

30.0

1

31.0

1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

2,100

2,200

2,300

2,400

2,500

2,600

13.0

1

16.0

1

17.0

1

18.0

1

19.0

1

20.0

1

23.0

1

24.0

1

25.0

1

26.0

1

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1

30.0

1

31.0

1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

8,000

8,500

9,000

9,500

10,000

13.0

1

16.0

1

17.0

1

18.0

1

19.0

1

20.0

1

23.0

1

24.0

1

25.0

1

26.0

1

27.0

1

30.0

1

31.0

1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

40

41

42

43

44

45

13.0

1

16.0

1

17.0

1

18.0

1

19.0

1

20.0

1

23.0

1

24.0

1

25.0

1

26.0

1

27.0

1

30.0

1

31.0

1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

5,200

5,400

5,600

5,800

6,000

6,200

13.0

1

16.0

1

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1

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1

19.0

1

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1

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1

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1

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1

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1

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1

30.0

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1

01.0

2

02.0

2

03.0

2

06.0

2

07.0

2

08.0

2

09.0

2

Other indices

More room

to rally?

Stocks report

After a few weeks of solidgains from Europeanindices, last week had in-vestors questioning whetherit was time to cash in onsome of the profits. With lit-tle macroeconomic newscoming out last week, mar-ket participants focused inon Greece. On Monday,investors reacted bearishly toyet another deadline havinglapsed in Athens, as politicalleaders failed to respond tobailout terms from the EUand IMF. Although mostindices in Europe closed inthe red, Poland’s WIG indexmanaged to close 0.84 per-cent higher. Shares of devel-oper GTC rose 10 percent,up nearly 20 percent sincethe beginning of 2012.

On Tuesday, stocksthroughout Europe were ledlower as a string of poor cor-porate earnings from many

of Europe’s leading banksdisappointed investors. Inparticular, weak earningsfrom Swiss bank UBS hurtinvestor sentiment. TheWIG lost nearly half a per-cent. On Wednesday, stocksgot some relief as newsemerged that a deal wasbeing reached to secure€130 billion in rescue fund-ing for Greece. Stocks fin-ished mildly higher, with theWIG gaining 0.31 percent,while the WIG20 gained0.08 percent.

On Thursday, stocks con-tinued their mild gains asGreece agreed to a toughausterity package. Stocks fin-ished mixed, with most ofWestern Europe up, whilethe WIG closed lower. OnFriday, stocks throughoutEurope fell further as addi-tional austerity conditionswere imposed on Greece. ●

Andrew Nawrocki, WBJ market analyst

FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 SPORTS www.wbj.pl 21

Gortat not

among NBA

All-Stars

Polish basketball star

Marcin Gortat has failed

to make the Western

Conference team for the

NBA All-Star game

which takes place on

February 24 in Orlando.

The “Polish Hammer”

has been in sparkling

form for the Phoenix

Suns this season with an

average of 14.7 points

per game, but it was not

enough to ensure he

made it to the meeting of

the NBA’s best players.

England

manager

resignsWith less than four

months to go until Euro

2012 kicks off in

Warsaw, England’s

international soccer

team is in turmoil

following national team

coach Fabio Capello’s

decision to resign from

his post over a

disagreement with

England’s Football

Association (FA). The FA

had decided to strip

Chelsea defender John

Terry of the England

captaincy following

allegations that he

racially abused Queens

Park Rangers player

Anton Ferdinand. But Mr

Capello felt Mr Terry

should be given the

benefit of the doubt until

his trial, which is due to

take place after Euro

2012.

Biesiadzka in

serious luge

accidentNatalia Biesiadzka, a 17-

year-old Polish luger,

has suffered a serious

leg injury in training. She

was preparing for the

Junior World

Championships in

Koenigssee, Germany.

“Biesiadzka suffered an

open fracture of the

ankle and has broken two

bones in her leg. She

found a very good clinic,

and she already had her

first operation, which was

a success,” said Pawe∏

Kozak, secretary general

of the Polish Association

of Sports. The Junior

World Championships

take place on February

18 and 19. ●

Euro 2012

Fewer fans at Euro 2012The number ofsupporters who visitPoland during theEuro 2012 group stagecould be as low as200,000

The number of foreign soc-cer fans traveling to Polandfor Euro 2012 could be muchlower than initially forecast,according to a new reportfrom the country’s Ministryof Sport and Tourism. It waspreviously expected that470,000-710,000 soccer fanswould come to Poland for the

2012 European champion-ship, but new research sug-gests there could be as few as200,000.

“We have to downgradethe number of soccer fans weexpect,” said Dariusz ¸apiƒskifrom organizing body PL.2012.

According to the mostrecent calculations, for gamesinvolving the Czech Republic,Russia, Croatia and Ireland,between 10,000-12,000 fansfrom each country are expect-ed to attend.

The lowest number of fansare expected to come fromItaly, Spain and Greece, with

only 5,000 fans predicted totravel for each of their respec-tive countries’ group matches.

It is believed that the highprice of travel and accommo-dation during the tournament,as well as economic difficultiesin countries such as Greeceand Ireland, may play a role indetermining the number offans that travel to Poland.

Three teams with tradition-ally the largest traveling sup-port – England, the Nether-lands and Germany – will eachplay all three of their groupmatches in Ukraine.

David Ingham SH

UT

TE

RS

TO

CK

Base camps

Majority of Euro 2012 teams set to stay in PolandOnly three of the 16teams have chosenaccommodation inUkraine

During the group stages of thissummer’s Euro 2012 soccerchampionship, 13 of the final16 qualifying nations havedecided to base their interna-tional squads at hotels andtraining facilities aroundPoland. This is despite eightteams having to play all threeof their group matches in theUkrainian cities of Kiev,Donetsk, Kharkiv and Lviv.

Only co-hosts Ukraine, andfellow Group D teams Franceand Sweden, will be based out-side Poland.

England, the final team inGroup D, has decided to stayat Hotel Stary in the center ofKraków’s old town, which

means the players will have totravel a distance of 1,323 kmfor their two games againstFrance and Ukraine in Donet-sk. The Football Associationdecided on the hotel prior to

the final draw and it has sincedecided to stay in Kraków forthe entirety of the tournament,despite potentially not playinga single game on Polish soil.

But it is now unclear who

will be staying in the hotel’spresidential suite, a room for-mally allocated to Englandmanager Fabio Capello prior tohis shock resignation last week.

Poland’s national team willbe hoping to make the most ofits home advantage, havingdecided to stay at the five-starHotel Hyatt Regency in War-saw. The team’s training basefor pre-match preparations willbe Polonia Warsaw’s stadium.

Russia has also decided ona base in the capital, staying atthe Le Meridien Bristol hotel,which is located on Warsaw’shistoric ul. Krakowskie Przed-mieÊcie. Greece and Croatiawill also be staying relativelyclose to the capital at hotels inSerock and Warka respective-ly, while Poland’s Group Arivals the Czech Republic willstay in Wroc∏aw.

Germany, three-time Eu-ropean Championship win-ners, have opted to stay in theBaltic coast city of Gdaƒsk,while the Republic of Ireland,who qualified for the finalstages of the tournament foronly the second time, will bebased just down the road inSopot. The coastal town ofKo∏obrzeg, close to the Ger-man border, will be home tothe 1992 European championsDenmark, with current hold-ers Spain situated further eastin Gniewino.

Portugal will be based inOpalenica, 40 km west of Poz-naƒ. Euro 2000 finalist Italy isset to be based in Wieliczka,while Euro 1988 winner theNetherlands has joined Eng-land in choosing Kraków as itsEuro 2012 location.

David Ingham

Ski jumping

Stoch continues winning formThe Polish ski jumpermoves up to fourth inthe championshipafter another first-place finishPoland’s leading ski jumper,Kamil Stoch, secured anothervictory in the World Cup aftera first-place finish at Val diFiemme, Italy.

Mr Stoch, who has been ingreat form since the turn ofthe year, beat Austria’s GregorSchlierenzauer, with a final-round jump of 131.5 meters.Victory for the 24-year-oldfrom Zakopane was enough toensure he leapfrogged anotherAustrian, Thomas Morgen-stern, in the World Cup stand-ings. The Pole is now in fourthplace in the 2012 table, withAndreas Kofler currently atthe top of the standings.

Another fine performancehas once again drawn compar-

isons between the youngsterand Poland’s former ski-jump-ing great Adam Ma∏ysz. ButMr Stoch will have to go a longway if he is to equal the 34-year-old’s record of finishing

first at the end of a season onfour separate occasions.

Mr Ma∏ysz, who retired in2011, is widely regarded as oneof Poland’s greatest athletes ofall time. DI

National Stadium

Super Cup called offThe game, which wasdue to take place atthe National Stadium,was canceled amidsafety fears

The Polish Super Cup matchbetween Legia Warsaw andWis∏a Kraków has been calledoff indefinitely after Warsaw’snew National Stadium failedto obtain the appropriate safe-ty permit in order to host thematch.

The annual game, whichtakes place between the previ-ous year’s Ekstraklasa winners(Wis∏a) and the Polish Cupwinners (Legia), was due to beheld on February 11.

But following discussionsbetween the city authorities,health and safety officials andthe Ministry of Sport andTourism, it was decided thatthe game could not take place

at the newly opened NationalStadium.

“As the Minister of Sportand Tourism, with all mypower I want to emphasizethat the Ministry did not andcould not affect the directionof this decision,” Poland’sSports Minister JoannaMucha wrote in a statement.

“The organizers of suchoperations must take intoaccount the need to meetstricter safety requirementsthan those applicable to othermass events,” she added,before stating that the sched-uled friendly match betweenPoland and Portugal on May15 is also unlikely to take placeat the stadium.

Ms Mucha did howeverseek to assure Polish soccerfans that the venue will defi-nitely be ready to host matchesat this summer’s Euro 2012tournament. DI

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Wayne Rooney will be staying with the English team in

Kraków

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FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012LIFESTYLE22 www.wbj.pl

POSTDOCUMENT. Missing Documents. Photographs of the PolishTransformation After 1989 February 3 – April 15Centre for Contemporary ArtUjazdowski Castle ul. Jazdów 2 Warsaw

“Missing Documents” is anexhibition of photography cap-turing Poland’s transformation

from communism, as seenthrough the eyes of bothdomestic and foreign photog-raphers. The photos on displayshow a country in economic,social, and cultural turmoil,seeking to find an new identityin a society moving towards anew capitalist era.

The exhibition is the first ofa new three-year program enti-tled “POSTDOCUMENT”which aims to give exposure to

some of the most interestingdocumentary phenomena inphotography, film, and nonfic-tion literature.

Visitors to the Centre forContemporary Art can expectto see works that present aunique glimpse at Poland’s past,from renowned photographersincluding Anna Beata Boh-dziewicz, Chris Niedenthal,Tomasz Tomaszewski and Woj-ciech Wieteska. David Ingham

MadonnaAugust 1National StadiumWarsaw

US superstar Madonna is setto perform at Poland’s newNational Stadium on August 1,as part of her latest world tour.The tour, which begins in TelAviv on May 29, is to promoteMadonna’s new album“MDNA” which will be out onMarch 26. The album is theMaterial Girl’s 12th studiorelease since her self-titleddebut in 1983.

“Madonna’s performance atthe National Stadium in War-saw will be one of the mostspectacular music events in2012 and will surely remain inthe memory of all who come toher concert,” said Rafa∏ Kapler,president of the NationalSports Centre. “We are happyto see the queen of pop inPoland and this concert simply

cannot be missed,” he added.Tickets for the concert,

which are priced from z∏.149 toz∏.1,171, go on sale from

February 17.Izabela Depczyk

For more information log on tostadionnarodowy.org.pl

Exhibition

A window into the pastConcert

Material Girl comes to Warsaw

SensoFebruary 26, 6 pmNational Theater Pl.TeatralnyWarsaw

This month the NationalTheater will play host to thePolish premiere of an operabased on Camillo Boito’s 1883

novella of the same name. Senso, which is set in

Venice during its occupationby the Austro-Hungarianempire, tells the story of thetragedy that unfolds whenCountess Livia falls in lovewith an Austrian lieutenant.After she discovers he hasbeen unfaithful, she denounces

him as a deserter, thus con-demning him to death.

This extraordinary tale oflove, desire, betrayal, andhumiliation is directed byArgentina’s Hugo de Ana,who also designed the spectac-ular costumes and set, withLuigi Neri responsible for thechoreography. DI

Opera

Sensory overload

Centre for ContemporaryArt at Ujazdowski Castle ul. Jazdów 2www.csw.art.pl

Czarna Gallery ul. Marsza∏kowska 4www.czarnagaleria.art.pl

Galeria 022, DAP, Lufcik ul. Mazowiecka 11awww.owzpap.pl

Galeria 65 ul. Bema 65www.galeria65.com

Galeria Appendix 2ul. Bia∏ostocka 9www.appendix2.com

Galeria Asymetria ul. Nowogrodzka 18awww.asymetria.eu

Galeria Foksal ul. Foksal 1-4www.galeriafoksal.pl

Galeria Milano Rondo Waszyngtona 2A www.milano.arts.pl

Galeria Schody ul. Nowy Âwiat 39www.galeriaschody.pl

Galeria XX1 Al. Jana Paw∏a II 36www.galeriaxx1.pl

Galeria Zoya ul. Kopernika 32 m.8www.zoya.art.pl

Green Gallery ul. Krzywe Ko∏o 2/4www.greengallery.pl

Katarzyna Napiórkowska Art Galleryul. Âwi´tokrzyska 32, ul.Krakowskie PrzedmieÊcie 42/44and Old Town Square 19/21www.napiorkowska.pl

Królikarnia National Galleryul. Pu∏awska 113awww.krolikarnia.mnw.art.pl

Le Guern Galleryul. Widok 8, www.leguern.pl

Museum of IndependenceAleja SolidarnoÊci 62www.muzeumniepodleglosci.art.pl

National Museum in Warsaw Al. Jerozolimskie 3www.mnw.art.pl

Polish National Opera atTeatr WielkiPl. Teatralny 1www.teatrwielki.pl

Pracownia Galeriaul. Emilii Plater 14www.pracowniagaleria.pl

Rempex Art and Auction Houseul. Karowa 31www.rempex.com.pl

Royal CastlePl. Zamkowy 4www.zamek-krolewski.com.pl

Simonis Galleryul. Burakowska 9www.simonisgallery.com

State ArchaeologicalMuseum in Warsawul. D∏uga 52, www.pma.pl

State Ethnographic Museumul. Kredytowa 1www.ethnomuseum.website.pl

Historical Museum of Warsaw Old Town Square 28-42www.mhw.pl

History Meeting House of Warsaw ul. Karowa 20www.dsh.waw.pl

Warsaw Philharmonic ul. Jasna 5www.filharmonia.pl

Warsaw Rising Museum ul. Grzybowska 79www.1944.pl

Wilanów Palace Museumand Wilanów PosterMuseumul. St Kostki Potockiego 10/16www.milanow-palac.plwww.postermuseum.pl

Zachęta National Art GalleryPl. Ma∏achowskiego 3www.zacheta.art.pl

Museums, galleries and venues in Warsaw

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FEBRUARY 13-19, 2012 LAST WORD www.wbj.pl 23

Kitchen tech and kitchen kitsch

Tech Eye

“The way to a man’s heart is throughhis stomach,” old GrandmotherTecheye used to say.“Dependingon yourchoice ofspices, itcan alsobe theway to hisinsurancep o l i c y , ”she alwaysadded, a mischie-vous twinkle in hereye.

Grandma sureknew a lot aboutmen – she musthave cooked forseven or eighthusbands overthe years – andher kitchen wasalways filledwith cookiejars. Soperhapsit’s nos u r -priset h a tthe kitchen is our third-favoriteroom in the house, following theharem chamber and the cheesepantry.

Kitchens are magical places thatTecheye understands in principle butnot in practice, places where mun-dane ingredients like flour, sugarand milk are transmogrified intomorsels of divinity. They are templesswathed in mystery and bacon, mon-uments testifying to the transcen-dent glory of eupepsia. Most impor-tantly, the kitchen is where you findcookies. And beer.

And so, out of love for thekitchen – and in serendipitous con-junction with Valentine’s Day – thisweek’s column is devoted to the hottechnology of haute cuisine.

Just don’t expect to read abouthand mixers, because they’re evil. Infact, here’s some free advice: If any-one ever says “Hey, wanna get nasty

with my new hand mixer?” youranswer should be “No.” Even if that

person

has emerged from a gentle oceanfroth on a giant seashell, walked toshore on a miraculous catwalk ofinexplicably erotic foam and stoodnaked before you, vibrating with thepromise of unearthly, hand-mixeddelight … even then, the answer is“No.”

Why? Because it never ends well,that’s why. Stick to stand mixers,which are generally superior to handmixers and much more difficult toget nasty with.

Take the Artisan five-quart tilt-head stand mixer from KitchenAid(kitchenaid.com), for example. For$399.99 you get an all-metalmachine with a 325-watt motordesigned to craft wholesome deli-ciousness with little or no bodilyharm. And the five-quart bowl yieldsa splendid nine-dozen cookies inone batch.

On the other hand, the Artisan

comes with a “flat beater,” a“dough hook” and a “wire whip,”all of which sound suspiciously las-civious, so perhaps it’s not muchbetter than a hand mixer after all.

Something a little lesstechy and a lot moreRuskie is the MatryoshkaDoll Measuring Cup Set.There are six plastic dry-

measure cups nested withineach other, made by an outfitwhich is either called Fred or

Fred & Friends. It’snot entirely

clear, but itd o e s n ’ treally mat-ter – youcan findthem onA m a z o nfor a little

over $9. There’s not

a whole lot more to sayabout them, except that we’ve

always found matryoshkadolls to be a little creepy.The idea of five or moreother people hiding in

your stomach, with faces justlike yours, ready to pop out at anymoment … ugh.

So let’s move on, shall we? Lastup is a kitchen gadget that is plain-ly for lazy people like us. It’s calledthe “Twirling Spaghetti Fork,” andthat pretty much says it all. Thefork requires two AAA batteries towork and it boasts a sassy-sounding“dishwasher-safe metal prongend.” It’s sold for $10.45 by itsmaker, Hog Wild(hogwildtoys.com), which is a cou-ple of bucks cheaper than on Ama-zon.

By the way, we have our eyes ona number of other kitchen-orient-ed gadgets from Hog Wild, like theKabuki Bottle Opener, the BeetleSpork and the Moo MixerSupreme. Watch out, cheesepantry – with toys like these, thekitchen will soon be our second-favorite room. ●

Ever been propositioned on a beach by a naked person wielding a hand mixer? Let us know: techeye.wbj@gmail.com

To advertise in WBJ’s classifieds section, contactMs Agnieszka Brejwo, at

(+48) 222-577-526 or abrejwo@wbj.pl

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