Under the norms of the Forest Code in its new edition the Subjects of the Federation are provided with the most important powers of managing the development of forests. To make forests management more eff ective, it is necessary that a big volume of forest be rented at a higher price annually, hence increasing the regional budget input. It is natural that some objective factors impede eff ective management growth, but there are also some reasons of a subjective nature. Some decisions of the Federal administration, which relate to the principles of the “hand management” and do not comply with the logic of the Forest Code, are reasonably believed to hinder eff ective forest managing and forming a sound forest market.

This article is devoted to the evaluation of the capabilities of the regional public administration to handle forest relations eff ectively and restrictions, both objective and subjective, that they face in the course of work.