Economics and Management 5 (3) 2013

The article analyzes data from a pilot study conducted among people above 55 years of age living in Podlaskie Voivodeship. The results suggest that seniors from the Podlaskie voivodeship mostly prefer sightseeing trips (26%) and recreation (26%), most carrying them out in the company of family (46%). They are willing to go on both short-term (35%) and long term visits (29%). As a means of transport the respondents mainly indicated the car (33%). Most frequently they independently organize their trips (51%), and in the 75% of cases they finance them with their own funds. On the basis of a comparative analysis of the obtained results with the results of research conducted by the Pretendent Research Corporation on behalf of the Minister of Sport and Tourism in 2010, it should be noted that despite the many differences in other spheres of life, seniors from the Podlaskie have quite similar, but not identical needs of and experiences in the field of tourism activity, as the remaining part of the Polish population above 55 years of age.

Keywords:
elderly  tourism  tourist activity 

The paper presents the evaluation of the scope and ways of animals use in tourism on the basis of tourist farm`s Internet offers operating in rural areas of Lublin and Podlasie voivodships. The analysis points to the inadequate use of animals in rural tourism both in the number of available species and ways to make them available for tourism. Animals may be the theme of the tourism product, but the new, lesser-known species of animals, including animals living in the wild should be placed on the tourist farms. Another way to increase the attractiveness of the tourism product is the use of therapeutic properties of animals.

Keywords:
rural tourism  tourism product  animals 

In a survey, conducted on a group of people practicing recreational riding in selected eques-trian centers of Podlaskie, assessed the level of interest it enjoys this form of recreation and special pleasure riders. The most of respondents stated that the main reason is their equestrian passion for animals and a desire to close contact with the horse. Recrea-tional riders of Podlaskie quite regularly use the services of equestrian centers, more than half of them rides a horse once or twice a week, preferring to ride individually. Podlasie riders often ride on Unemployed horse, which is also the most in equestrian centers. Equestrian center distance from the residence of riding, it was one of the main criteria for selec-tion.

Keywords:
horse recreation  equestrian centers  the scale of interest 

An indispensable element associated with civilization development is the need to move people to destinations outside their everyday environment. From year to year, the increas-ingly escalating passenger traffic requires attention to transport issues. Rail transport con-stitutes an important part of the land passenger transport. It should be noted, however, that does not play quite as an important role in handling passenger traffic, as in the nine-teenth and early twentieth century. This is connected not only with the competition from the other modes of transport, but also with infrastructure limitations (Kurek, 2008). The purpose of this article is to to establish the basis for a preliminary analyze the prefer-ences and the frequency of using passenger rail services by the residents of Bialystok and verification of the used research tool. The main method applied in the conducted research was a diagnostic survey, carried out using a questionnaire technique among the inhabitants of Bialystok. Results of the research show that half of the respondents use the passenger railway transport from 1 to 5 times a year. Only 12% of subjects very often or often use the railway in order to travel to school or college and 11% while traveling on business. During the travels relating to leisure time, almost half of respondents do not use the services of the railway transport at all. Most respondents prefer traveling by train in 2nd class, in non-smoking compartments. The respondents most often use Cheap Railway Lines (TLK), and are least likely to use connections operated by EuroCity, Express, Regional Express and In-tercity Express. Also, most of them spend up to PLN 300 per year on travelling by train.

Keywords:
passenger railway transport  preferences and frequency of travel 

The aim of this article is to analyze differences in the level of expenditure on culture, recre-ation, hotels and restaurants and their share in the total expenditure of households. Object of interest were European households, with a focus on the place of Polish households. The research material consisted CSO and Eurostat. There were very large differences in spending on recreation, culture, hotels and restaurants between households of different European countries. There has been a low spending on goods and services related to leisure time in Poland. The structure of expenditures steadily increased role of recreation and cultural services.

Keywords:
expenditure  recreation  culture  hotel  restaurant  crisis 

As of July 1, 2013 the law on maintenance of clean and orderly conditions in communities is in force. According to it, each community is responsible for collecting waste from property owners. It is also responsible for the construction, maintenance and exploitation of regional installations for processing of municipal waste by selecting, through a call for tenders, an entity to carry out this task or to select a private partner or a license holder. In the case of not adjudicating a tender or not making a choice the community can independently build, maintain and exploit regional installations for processing community waste. Implementa-tion of provisions of the law guarantees construction of the a waste collection and manage-ment system as well as recovery of recyclable materials. However, the law on waste man-agement has generated numerous problems, arousing various controversies in local gov-ernments and dissatisfaction among residents. This complications are mainly associated with the rates of charges, with commotion generated by waste collection and with rivalry between community owned companies and private companies over influence on the waste management market. A subsequent amendment of this law and proposals for changes pre-sented to the lawmakers may contribute in resolving these problems.

Keywords:
law on waste management  amendment of the waste management law  waste manage-ment  waste collection  communalization of waste 

The main goal of the present article is to analyze the inflow of foreign direct investments according to their location in Polish cities. To realize this goal it was necessary to draft the-oretical background comprising review of definitions of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) together with presented authors own definition and analyze of literature within the theme of the significance of FDI for the economic development of Poland. The main goal of the article has been realized through two rankings worked out by authors. First one concerns arranging Polish cities according to the number of attracted bigger FDI in the long-term, that is from the beginning of Polish transformation up to the end of year 2012. The second rank-ing differs from the first one because of period of time which is shorter term of last five years 2008-2012.

Keywords:
foreign direct investments  foreign capital  economic development 

In modern democracies, an important place is occupied election. The article provides an overview of selected electoral problems and dilemmas, which should be addressed by law experts, politicians and voters. The article taken into account the changes made by the electoral code of 2011, the beginning of the dilemmas raised related to identifying people who are active and passive right to vote in local elections (citizenship and age). Then the problem of increasing the participation of women in political life, whether in Poland or are needed and the amount of gender parity on electoral lists? In this paper we find the opin-ions of the author on one-mandate constituencies in local elections. Finally, we will put electoral code of alternative voting (vote by postal, postal vote).

Keywords:
electoral law  local government  electoral code 

The article describes participation of the St Petersburg’s merchants in the local government of Russian capital, particulary in the merchant administration. The text analises principal activities of marchant Council and the role of various merchants in the activities of self-government.

Keywords:
Merchant Council  entrepreneurs  education  Peter the Great School of Commerce  Ministry of Finance 

Nowadays modern forms of employment do not guarantee the stability. A turbulent reality, uncertainty of employment encourages to search for new, alternative solutions. In the process the activity known as enterpreneurship is a necessity. Today the sign of enterpreneurship is self-employment. The number of self-employed females in the European Union is 30,6% whereas in Poland it reaches 34,3%. The culture norms, according to which enterpreneurship is a male dominant slowly changes its form. Although the number of self-employment among women has risen for last 10 years, there is plenty to do in this area. The main thing is to create conditions in which active, enterpreneurial women will be allowed to develop their businesses easily. The surrounding of enterprises is not a main factor that benefits the development of enterpreneurship. What is more, this phenomenon points out the necessity of territorial autonomy interference in order to improve the activity of small and medium businesses in Podlaskie Voivodeship.

Keywords:
female enterpreneurship  territorial autonomy 

Women's entrepreneurship in modern society is becoming increasingly important. From year to year, because of technological developments progressively decreases the number of jobs in those sectors of the economy, where women have traditionally worked. At the same time, number of women with a university degree increases, but they face many barriers to employment. Unemployment among women is higher than male unemployment. The way to financial independence and the income growth is business or self-employment. Most studies confirm that women are just as entrepreneurial as men. Women entrepre-neurship contributes to economic development by creating new products and jobs. There-fore, from an economic and social point of view, it is necessary to promote and facilitate entrepreneurship among women and increasing their share of the business owners. Institutions of higher education may contributed to that.

Keywords:
female entrepreneurship  barriers to female entrepreneurship 

Borderline is a multi-dimensional regions. The target of promotion of such territory is building its brand on the basis of stable clearly identifiable characteristics. It is realized in the network model. Optimally it is a unit of regular and consistent action in the different campaigns. As seen in the borderline Podlasie territorial unit value increases if not only meets the certain expectations of their customers, but as a brand recommended others.

Keywords:
borderline  multidimensional  network  promotion 

The subject of this article is the role of the city of Białystok in governmental strategic docu-ments, such as National Spatial Development Concept 2030, National Development Strategy 2020, and Long-Term National Development Strategy. In particular, the thesis concerns practical consequences of the Białystok’s position for planned development of Polish com-munication system. This rank is not clear. On one hand, Bialystok, as the capital of the province, is one of the most important urban areas of the country. On the other hand, Białystok is not recognized as metropolis, with could involves decrease of position of local and regional development needs.

Keywords:
regional development  Białystok  podlaskie voivodship  metropolies  transport investments 

Public hearing allows the citizens to submit their opinion concerning legal acts’ proposals and at the same time to participate in the law making process. This article analyses legal norms regulating above-mentioned Polish law public hearing. The Presidential bill related to public hearing on the local government level was also taken into the consideration.

Keywords:
public heating  law setting 

Podlaskie Province in terms of level of socio-economic development takes place before the last one in the country. For the government document "Report Poland 2030 - Development Challenges", considered the foundation for developing the National Strategy for Regional Development, Podlaskie was assigned to Category B - peripheral areas where development is to proceed on a process of diffusion effects in the growth centers. This means that only the use of endogenous sources of growth in the form of internal resources of the region. And abandoning redistributive practices in regional policy. This development program has its limitations. One of them is the effect of 'leaching' of human resources. The concept of the backwash effect was introduced to the theory of regional development by G. Myrdal in 1957. G. Myrdal by backwash effect means any significant adverse changes in trade, mi-gration, capital movements, which operate centripetally causing recessionary processes in less developed regions and increasing their distance in relation to the growth poles. In the province of Podlaskie the backwash effect is the ongoing process for many years. This phenomenon manifests itself in a fall in the number of inhabitants in the different subre-gions, counties and municipalities, the decline in the percentage of women in the age group from 19 to 29 in the general population and the growing proportion of women in this age group in the external and internal migration. An additional manifestation of these processes is "sucking" of labor resources through the poles of growth, revealing a balance of internal and external migration - with a large positive value in the centers and a large negative value in remote areas. Among those who emigrate, leaving the Podlaskie Province over 57% are women. Among immigrants aged 20-24 is two times more women than men. At the beginning of the XXI century, the towns and cities of Podlaskie have a greater outflow than inflow of population. But under a polarizing development model of growth cities are its main source. This article aims to identify barriers to the development of Podlaskie based on endogenous sources, as their resources, especially when labor resources and human capital are shrinking due to the backwash effects. Despite the expenditure incurred by residents for education, the effects of this investment goes to the center along with the 'washing' of human resources. That is redistribution of income from poorer regions, with small resource capital to richer with large pools of capital and favorable labor market situation.

Keywords:
regional development  the outermost regions  human capital  leaching of resources  regional policy