New PZS General Secretary Appointed

On Thursday, March 31, 2011, the Management Board of the Alpine Association of Slovenia unanimously approved and appointed Matej Planko from PD Slivnica pri Celju as the new General Secretary of the Alpine Association of Slovenia. Nine candidates applied for the repeated PZS call for a new General Secretary, which was published at the Employment Service of the Republic of Slovenia on March 11, 2011.





Matej Planko knows the functioning of the mountaineering organization very well, as he has been actively involved in voluntary mountaineering for many years, and since 2003 to this day he has also performed the duties of president of the Mountaineering Club Slivnica pri Celju. He has been a member of the mountaineering organization since 1987, is a PZS guide (since 1991) and enthusiastic about mountaineering orienteering, where he achieved good results as a competitor and organizer. Together with his home mountaineering club, he successfully organized the final national mountaineering orienteering competition SPOT 2008 and this year's National Youth and Mountains Competition. He is also actively involved and collaborates in organizing youth mountaineers' camps in the Savinja Inter-club Mountaineering Associations Committee. Otherwise, the 39-year-old university-trained mechanical engineer has been employed in the Alpos business system since 1998. For the last ten years, he worked in managerial positions in various parts of the Alpos company, most recently as head of development in one of the subsidiaries, and also participated in the development-investment consortium that successfully draws funds from the European Development Funds. He was appointed to the position of PZS General Secretary for a term of four years with a six-month probationary period.



New PZS General Secretary Matej Planko thanked for the trust upon appointment and boldly looked to the future: "I applied for the General Secretary position because I know I can connect previous work and knowledge of voluntary mountaineering with the experience I gained in my current job and offer something positive to the mountaineering organization. Together with the employees in the professional service, we will build on previous work and bring the umbrella organization even closer to the mountaineering clubs and their needs. We will also raise the level of professionalism in the professional services to provide quality service to all parent committees and boards operating under the Alpine Association of Slovenia. A lot of work awaits us in creating the recognizability of the mountaineering association, which includes 263 clubs and over 57,000 members; under its umbrella are top athletes reaching the world top, and on the other side, a widespread network of voluntary mountaineering clubs cares for the mountaineering infrastructure that we all use. There are certainly additional opportunities for obtaining funds from calls that we have not yet utilized. There is also the marketing of our own programs, especially mountaineering publications. In short, there are many challenges, and I will tackle them diligently with the collaboration and engagement of all employees in the professional service of the Alpine Association of Slovenia. Once again, I thank all members of the PZS Management Board for their unanimous support. This means even greater responsibility for me, but I look forward to open, creative and correct collaboration with everyone."