Association Profile and Mission

The Employers' Association of Mining and Oil Industries (henceforth referred to as ZSDNP) is an independent voluntary organisation that represents the mining entrepreneur and employer communities in the Czech Republic.

At the establishment of the Association in the constitutive meeting in Ostrava in May 1990, 8 organisations became members of it. At present (2011), the Association brings together 22 organisations with about 33 300 workers.  

The members are significant joint-stock companies and state enterprises of coal, ores, industrial minerals and oil industries, including a wide spectrum of organisations that are closely connected with or consequent on mining activities. They are building, engineering, reclamation, and other organisations concerned with consulting activity, exploration, design, the treatment and recycling of mineral raw materials.  

In the course of industry restructuring process with the gradual phase-out of mining, i.e. during the whole existence of the Association, the mission of the Association is to protect the interests of its members, to formulate and to enforce their goals in negotiations with the state authorities, trade unions and also with other subjects and institutions.  

Recently, among the main activities of ZSDNP those activities can be ranked that are linked especially with problems of the preparation of a new mining act, the elaboration of state energy policy and with problems of phase-out processes. The Association represents its members in negotiations with the Trade Union of Workers in Mining, Geology and Oil Industry and Trade Union of Power and Mining about the higher-level collective agreement, permanently coordinates the activities of its members and supports their intercooperation. In the year 1994 the Association established the company Agricola, s.r.o. that ensures services for it and accomplishes other special tasks which follow from the activities and operation of the Association.  

The Association produces a technical-economic bimonthly periodical Uhlí - Rudy - Geologický průzkum (Coal - Ores - Geological Exploration) by which it makes the professional public familiar with information regarding the area of science, engineering, economy and practice associated with mining activities. Furthermore, the Association is a co-publisher of Mining Yearbook, in which the basic statistical and organizational data on mining business in the Czech Republic are annually updated.   

The Association guarantees and organises various national professional events. To the most significant events the International Symposium “Příbram ve vědě a technice” held each year belongs.

The Employers' Association also pays considerable attention to foreign activities. Since the year 1993 the Czech National Committee of Mining Congress that is incorporated into the International Organizing Committee of the World Mining Congress (IOC WMC) has been an organic part of ZSDNP. Since the year 1997 the Association has been a member of the European Solid Fuel Association (CECSO), i.e. EURACOAL at present.