Centralny Okreg Przemyslowy
Encyclopedia
The Central Industrial District , is an industrial region
in Poland
. It was one of the biggest economic projects of the Second Polish Republic
. The 5-year long project was initiated by a famous Polish economist, deputy Prime Minister
and Minister of the Treasury, Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski
. Its goal was to create a heavy industrial center in the middle of the country, as far as possible from any borders, strengthen the Polish economy and reduce unemployment
. The four-year plan for the development of COP was scheduled from 1 September 1936 until 30 July 1940 and was interrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War and the German invasion of Poland
on 1 September 1939. Nonetheless, the COP project succeeded in vastly expanding Polish industry, and after the end of the war in 1945 COP was rebuilt and expanded under the People's Republic of Poland
.
or Soviet Russia
. The plan was finally approved in 1936 by the Polish government. By April 1938, the plan, already set in motion in some parts of the country, was expanded to the territories beyond those covered by the original plan for the most secure 'triangle'.
COP was located in the territories of the following former voivodeship
s: eastern parts of Kielce Voivodship and Kraków Voivodship, southern part of Lublin Voivodeship
, and the western part of Lwów Voivodeship
, or in other terms, 46 powiat
s, constituting 15.4% of the territory of Poland and inhabited by 17% of Poland's population. The urbanization
factor of those territories was 17% (94 cities), compared to the national average of 30%. The arguments for such location of COP were:
The COP plan required gigantic financial investment - just the development of the infrastructure and the military industry was estimated at 3 billion zlotys. As the expectations of war grew, private investment in Europe in the late 1930s was small, and thus the Polish government carried most of the burden of financing the project; in the years 1937-1939, COP had consumed approximately 60% of all Polish investment funds.
(Huta Stalowa Wola
) and power plant in a brand new city of Stalowa Wola
, a rubber factory in Dębica
, an automobile factory in Lublin
, an aircraft factory in Mielec
, aircraft engine and artillery
factory in Rzeszów
, hydroelectric power plants in Rożnów
and Myszkowice
, expansion of Zakłady Azotowe in Mościce
. Military industry in the Staropolski Okręg Przemysłowy was expanded in the towns of Radom
, Skarżysko-Kamienna
, Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski
, Starachowice
, Kielce
. Most of those investments were located in regions with high unemployment, and their construction succeeded in reducing social tensions and began to strengthen the Polish economy.
The development of COP and similar projects, like the construction of the seaport in Gdynia
, were the most outstanding achievements of the Second Polish Republic, marking the beginning of the new era of the recently regained independence. The COP plan was continued by the communist government of Poland after the Second World War.
However, as the end date for the plan was the end of July 1940, and Poland did not have sufficient capital to carry out the entire plan on its own, few of the intended projects were completely operational before war broke out, and many other ones were not launched at all. Consequently, their contribution to the equipment of the Polish Army in the run-up to the war was relatively insignificant, and did little to offset the crushing material superiority of the German armed forces.
German blitzkrieg
tactics in the Second World War, with their rapid advances by fast motorized forces and long range air attacks, ensured that the COP region failed to provide a secure haven for Polish industry. In any event, the German dismemberment of Czechoslovakia
outflanked Poland from the south and put the COP factories in the direct path of German advance from Slovakia. During the German occupation, most of the factories were converted to contribute to the German war effort. After the war, the COP-initiated industrial enterprises were further expanded and for the most part continue to function until today.
Industrial region
Industrial region or industrial area refers to a region with extremely dense industry. It is usually heavily urbanized.-Brazil:*ABCD Region, sometimes called ABC is an industrial region made up of seven municipalities with the greater metropolitan area of São Paulo, Brazil.-Korea:*Kaesŏng...
in Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
. It was one of the biggest economic projects of the Second Polish Republic
Second Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
. The 5-year long project was initiated by a famous Polish economist, deputy Prime Minister
Prime minister
A prime minister is the most senior minister of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. In many systems, the prime minister selects and may dismiss other members of the cabinet, and allocates posts to members within the government. In most systems, the prime...
and Minister of the Treasury, Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski
Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski
Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski was a Polish politician and economist, Deputy Prime Minister of Poland, government minister and manager of the Second Polish Republic....
. Its goal was to create a heavy industrial center in the middle of the country, as far as possible from any borders, strengthen the Polish economy and reduce unemployment
Unemployment
Unemployment , as defined by the International Labour Organization, occurs when people are without jobs and they have actively sought work within the past four weeks...
. The four-year plan for the development of COP was scheduled from 1 September 1936 until 30 July 1940 and was interrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War and the German invasion of Poland
Invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...
on 1 September 1939. Nonetheless, the COP project succeeded in vastly expanding Polish industry, and after the end of the war in 1945 COP was rebuilt and expanded under the People's Republic of Poland
People's Republic of Poland
The People's Republic of Poland was the official name of Poland from 1952 to 1990. Although the Soviet Union took control of the country immediately after the liberation from Nazi Germany in 1944, the name of the state was not changed until eight years later...
.
The plan history
Starting in 1928, there were recurring attempts to create a triangle of security, an industrial region in the middle of the country, secured from any aggression by GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
or Soviet Russia
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. The plan was finally approved in 1936 by the Polish government. By April 1938, the plan, already set in motion in some parts of the country, was expanded to the territories beyond those covered by the original plan for the most secure 'triangle'.
Voivodeship
Voivodship is a term denoting the position of, or more commonly the area administered by, a voivod. Voivodeships have existed since medieval times in Poland, Romania, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia and Serbia....
s: eastern parts of Kielce Voivodship and Kraków Voivodship, southern part of Lublin Voivodeship
Lublin Voivodeship
- Administrative division :Lublin Voivodeship is divided into 24 counties : 4 city counties and 20 land counties. These are further divided into 213 gminas....
, and the western part of Lwów Voivodeship
Lwów Voivodeship
Lwów Voivodeship was an administrative unit of interwar Poland . According to Nazis and Soviets it ceased to exist in September 1939, following German and Soviet aggression on Poland . The Polish underground administration existed till August 1944.-Population:Its capital, biggest and most...
, or in other terms, 46 powiat
Powiat
A powiat is the second-level unit of local government and administration in Poland, equivalent to a county, district or prefecture in other countries. The term powiat is most often translated into English as "county", although other terms are also sometimes used...
s, constituting 15.4% of the territory of Poland and inhabited by 17% of Poland's population. The urbanization
Urbanization
Urbanization, urbanisation or urban drift is the physical growth of urban areas as a result of global change. The United Nations projected that half of the world's population would live in urban areas at the end of 2008....
factor of those territories was 17% (94 cities), compared to the national average of 30%. The arguments for such location of COP were:
- a) military - relatively long distance from the both western and eastern border (Poland was expecting future German or Soviet aggression), protected from the south by the Carpathian MountainsCarpathian MountainsThe Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians are a range of mountains forming an arc roughly long across Central and Eastern Europe, making them the second-longest mountain range in Europe...
. - b) demographic - fairly high density of population (100 people per square km) with high unemployment (400-700,000)
- c) economic - to strengthen the mostly agricultural market of eastern Poland and create a market for Western Poland's industrial products, and an energy market for southern Poland. In addition, this region had some undeveloped natural resources (stone, iron, clay, plus some energy resources).
- d) social - to reduce unemployment, still high in the mostly agricultural regions of eastern Poland, still feeling the aftershocks of the Great DepressionGreat DepressionThe Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
.
The COP plan required gigantic financial investment - just the development of the infrastructure and the military industry was estimated at 3 billion zlotys. As the expectations of war grew, private investment in Europe in the late 1930s was small, and thus the Polish government carried most of the burden of financing the project; in the years 1937-1939, COP had consumed approximately 60% of all Polish investment funds.
Achievements
The following industrial projects were part of the plan: a steel millSteel mill
A steel mill or steelworks is an industrial plant for the manufacture of steel.Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon. It is produced in a two-stage process. First, iron ore is reduced or smelted with coke and limestone in a blast furnace, producing molten iron which is either cast into pig iron or...
(Huta Stalowa Wola
Huta Stalowa Wola
Huta Stalowa Wola is a steel mill and manufacturing company in Stalowa Wola, Poland.It was established in 1938-1939 in Second Polish Republic. It was a major part of a series of investments made by the Polish government in the years 1936–1939 to create the Central Industrial Region...
) and power plant in a brand new city of Stalowa Wola
Stalowa Wola
Stalowa Wola is the largest city and capital of Stalowa Wola County with a population of 64,353 inhabitants, as of June 2008. It is located in southeastern Poland in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship...
, a rubber factory in Dębica
Debica
Dębica is a town in southeastern Poland with 46,693 inhabitants, as of 2 June 2009. It is the capital of Dębica County. Since 1999 it has been situated in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship; it had previously been in the Tarnów Voivodeship .-Area:...
, an automobile factory in Lublin
Lublin
Lublin is the ninth largest city in Poland. It is the capital of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 350,392 . Lublin is also the largest Polish city east of the Vistula river...
, an aircraft factory in Mielec
Mielec
Mielec is a city in south-eastern Poland with a population of 60,979 inhabitants, as of June 2009. It is located in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship ; previously it was in Rzeszów Voivodeship...
, aircraft engine and artillery
Artillery
Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons...
factory in Rzeszów
Rzeszów
Rzeszów is a city in southeastern Poland with a population of 179,455 in 2010. It is located on both sides of the Wisłok River, in the heartland of the Sandomierska Valley...
, hydroelectric power plants in Rożnów
Roznów
Rożnów may refer to the following places in Poland:*Rożnów, Lower Silesian Voivodeship *Rożnów, Lesser Poland Voivodeship *Rożnów, Opole Voivodeship...
and Myszkowice
Myszkowice
Myszkowice may refer to the following places in Poland:*Myszkowice, Lower Silesian Voivodeship *Myszkowice, Masovian Voivodeship *Myszkowice, Silesian Voivodeship...
, expansion of Zakłady Azotowe in Mościce
Moscice
Mościce is an industrial borough of the city of Tarnów in Poland, previously an industrial suburb. Located to the west of the city centre at the Biała river, it houses one of the largest and the first nitrate factory in Europe....
. Military industry in the Staropolski Okręg Przemysłowy was expanded in the towns of Radom
Radom
Radom is a city in central Poland with 223,397 inhabitants . It is located on the Mleczna River in the Masovian Voivodeship , having previously been the capital of Radom Voivodeship ; 100 km south of Poland's capital, Warsaw.It is home to the biennial Radom Air Show, the largest and...
, Skarżysko-Kamienna
Skarzysko-Kamienna
Skarżysko-Kamienna is a town in northern Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship in Poland by Kamienna river, to the north of Świętokrzyskie Mountains; one of the voivodship's major towns...
, Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski
Ostrowiec Swietokrzyski
Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski is a town in south-central Poland with 74,211 inhabitants .Main industry is metallurgy. Ostrowiec is the capital city of Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski County, part of Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship , previously it belonged to Kielce Voivodeship .- History:The oldest testimonies of...
, Starachowice
Starachowice
Starachowice is a town in south-central Poland with 55,126 inhabitants . Starachowice is situated in the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship ; it was formerly in the Kielce Voivodeship . It is the capital of Starachowice County...
, Kielce
Kielce
Kielce ) is a city in central Poland with 204,891 inhabitants . It is also the capital city of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship since 1999, previously in Kielce Voivodeship...
. Most of those investments were located in regions with high unemployment, and their construction succeeded in reducing social tensions and began to strengthen the Polish economy.
The development of COP and similar projects, like the construction of the seaport in Gdynia
Gdynia
Gdynia is a city in the Pomeranian Voivodeship of Poland and an important seaport of Gdańsk Bay on the south coast of the Baltic Sea.Located in Kashubia in Eastern Pomerania, Gdynia is part of a conurbation with the spa town of Sopot, the city of Gdańsk and suburban communities, which together...
, were the most outstanding achievements of the Second Polish Republic, marking the beginning of the new era of the recently regained independence. The COP plan was continued by the communist government of Poland after the Second World War.
However, as the end date for the plan was the end of July 1940, and Poland did not have sufficient capital to carry out the entire plan on its own, few of the intended projects were completely operational before war broke out, and many other ones were not launched at all. Consequently, their contribution to the equipment of the Polish Army in the run-up to the war was relatively insignificant, and did little to offset the crushing material superiority of the German armed forces.
German blitzkrieg
Blitzkrieg
For other uses of the word, see: Blitzkrieg Blitzkrieg is an anglicized word describing all-motorised force concentration of tanks, infantry, artillery, combat engineers and air power, concentrating overwhelming force at high speed to break through enemy lines, and, once the lines are broken,...
tactics in the Second World War, with their rapid advances by fast motorized forces and long range air attacks, ensured that the COP region failed to provide a secure haven for Polish industry. In any event, the German dismemberment of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
outflanked Poland from the south and put the COP factories in the direct path of German advance from Slovakia. During the German occupation, most of the factories were converted to contribute to the German war effort. After the war, the COP-initiated industrial enterprises were further expanded and for the most part continue to function until today.
See also
- Sandomierz Voivodeship (1939)Sandomierz Voivodeship (1939)Sandomierz Voivodeship , , was a proposed voivodeship of the Second Polish Republic, which was never created because of the Nazi and Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939...
- Upper Silesian Industry AreaUpper Silesian Industry AreaUpper Silesian Coal Basin is a coal basin in Silesia in Poland and Czech Republic. It also contains a number of other minable resources...
- GdyniaGdyniaGdynia is a city in the Pomeranian Voivodeship of Poland and an important seaport of Gdańsk Bay on the south coast of the Baltic Sea.Located in Kashubia in Eastern Pomerania, Gdynia is part of a conurbation with the spa town of Sopot, the city of Gdańsk and suburban communities, which together...
- Polish Coal Trunk-LinePolish Coal Trunk-LineThe Coal Trunk-Line is one of the most important rail connections in Poland.It crosses the central part of the country, from the coal mines and steelworks of Upper Silesia in the South to the Baltic Sea port of Gdynia in the North. The line is used mostly by freight trains: passenger connections...