EN
The current wording of „green areas" and „woodlots" definitions in the Nature Conservation Act gives rise to many interpretative problems as to where and what „green areas" versus „woodlots" are. In addition, the definitions given in the Nature Conservation Act are not used or referred to in other key acts and regulations, such the Environmental Protection Law, Act on spatial planning and land use, Act on roads, Regulation on land register, GUS [Central Statistical Office] reporting and other regulations by various ministries. The lack of unified, consistently-used terminological references in legal acts pertaining to green areas and woodlots is a major hindrance to communication between various professional groups involved in planning, designing and management of green areas, environmental protection and research activities. The articleunderlines the interpretative problems related to the terms „green areas" and „woodlots" in their current wording. The differences between definitions of these two terms used in various legal acts and reports in Poland presented in the article point to an urgent need to unify their meaning. If the current situation is not remedied, it will lead to hampered efficiency of protection and development of such areas. This is particularly important with the issue of green areas and woodlots becoming a priority factor in the plans developed by European cities. However, despite the general agreement of urban planners and researchers as regards the importance of these areas for urban development processes in the 21st century, as of yet there has been little success in creating a common definition of the so-called „green infrastructure" in the cities of the EU. This obstacle has been confirmed by the research carried out under the project: The European Cooperation in the Field of Scientific and Technical Research (COST-Action). (Konijnendijk et al., eds., 2005)