A Challenge for Even the Boldest

Over the past twenty years, changes in ownership structure have brought major changes to chemistry in Slovakia, as I learned during several years in top managerial positions in the Slovak Chemical Society (SCHS). SCHS (www.schems.sk), a former partner within the federally organised Czech chemical society, is affiliated with the Slovak Academy of Sciences (SAS).

From 1989 on, both Slovak and foreign individuals and groups started privatising key national enterprises in an effort to either maintain and develop existing business activities or snuff them out through restructuring in order to procure real estate or eliminate competition. This also occurred in Slovakia's well developed chemical and pharmaceutical industrial sector, from heavy chemical industry, such as Slovnaft in Bratislava and Duslo in Sala, to fine chemistry such as Slovakofarma in Hlohovec.

When chemists first organised eighty years ago, SCHS emerged as a leading organisation, recruiting its members mainly from academia. It was followed by the Slovak Society of Industrial Chemistry (SSPCH). SCHS activities

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