UNESCO has decided to include in its representative list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity the Czech “timber rafting” tradition. The multinational application “Timber Rafting” was made by six countries – Austria, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Poland, Spain and Germany. The craft, dating back to the 14th century, involves the transport of wood by waterways from areas rich in woodland to those in which it is scarcer. Timber rafting had a long tradition in the Czech lands, ranking among highly respected and recognised, but also dangerous professions. According to most sources, the first historical mention of timber rafting on the Vltava River dates back as far as medieval times. At the time, the biggest source of timber, needed for the construction of houses, was in South and Southwest Bohemia, and the fastest way to deliver the logs to different destinations was the river. Rafting on the Vltava ended after the Second World War when a cascade system of dams was built on the river. The timber rafting tradition received a very positive assessment from experts, who said it demonstrates the close connection of man with nature and the rational use of natural resources, which is fully in line with the European course towards sustainable development....
France’s EDF, South Korea’s KHNP, and U.S.-Canadian group Westinghouse Electric have made initial bids to build a new unit at the Czech Republic’s Dukovany nuclear power plant, Czech utility CEZ said on Wednesday. The Czech Republic has been a strong backer of nuclear energy as a carbon-free power source for the future, unlike European Union neighbours Germany and Austria. Majority of state-owned CEZ, which launched the Dukovany expansion tender in March, said final bids would come in by the end of September 2023. “We expect the contracts to be finalized in 2024,” board member Tomas Pleskac said in a statement. The 1,200 megawatt-unit should be completed in 2036 and help the country replace current Soviet-designed units at Dukovany that will eventually be decommissioned. CEZ plans to build three more nuclear units – on top of the one now planned – at its Dukovany and Temelin nuclear sites, as the country diversifies away from coal. It is also planning to build smaller modular nuclear power plants. Nuclear made up 36% of Czech electricity output in 2021. Candidates from China and Russia were excluded on security grounds, in contrast to Hungary which has chosen Russia’s Rosatom for its nuclear project. Poland picked Westinghouse last month to...
Czechia had the lowest rate of unemployment in the European Union in October, the Czech News Agency reported on Thursday citing Eurostat data. Data from the Czech Statistics Office indicates that unemployment in Czechia lay at 2.1 percent, compared to 2.2 percent in September. The Czech tradition of timber rafting, recognized as part of Czech traditional folk culture, has been added to UNESCO’s intangible cultural heritage list. The craft, dating back to the 14th century, involves the transport of wood by waterways from areas rich in woodland to those in which it is scarcer. The Chamber of Deputies has approved a bill that will enable Ukrainian soldiers to be trained in Czechia as well as for Czech soldiers to train Ukrainians in other EU member states. The training of Ukrainian troops will take place in the Libavá military zone in Central Moravia. Czechs have fewer books at home than a year ago, but they still read just as often as before, an average of two to three books a month, according to a survey conducted by the Knihobot secondhand bookstore. The survey involved more than 1,800 respondents from all over the Czech Republic. While one in...
Unemployment in the eurozone has dropped to a record low, at 6.5 percent in October, the EU’s Eurostat statistics office said Thursday. The reading — the lowest since Eurostat started compiling jobless figures in April 1998 — was an indicator that the economies of the 19 EU nations using the euro had bounced back after the Covid pandemic. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was markedly less than the 7.3 percent recorded a year ago. Data from the Czech Statistics Office indicates that unemployment in Czechia lay at 2.1 percent, compared to 2.2 percent in September. The country has had one of the lowest unemployment rates in the EU for several years now. Eurostat estimated that, for the entire 27-nation European Union, 12.95 million adults were unemployed in October — or 6.0 percent of the active population — with 10.87 million of them in the eurozone. While all OECD economies, with the exception of former EU member Britain, have recovered to their pre-pandemic size, global headwinds are stalling the recovery. The eurozone is likely to tip towards recession within weeks, according to the European Commission. Inflation is running hot, despite falling back in the latest reading on Wednesday, at 10 percent...
While we can’t wait for Christmas, what about doing something nice for someone else? On December 7th, you can take part in a charity event at Roxy. The aim is to give Christmas gifts to children from orphanages. The concert My Kind of Santa is organized in cooperation with the Organization for Refugee Aid (OPU), featuring Czech rapper Rest and Martin Matys, We Are Domi and The Silver Spoons. Since his first singles as Balkonovka, Rest has established a unique position among the leading Czech rappers during his ten years on the scene. He will be accompanied on the stag by his label mate Ty Nikdy Martin Matys. The line-up of the evening will also be completed by the Czech-Norwegian group We Are Domi led by Dominika Hašková, who represented the Czech Republic at Eurovision this year, and the indie-rock band The Silver Spoons. After a series of successful singles this year, the band has released their anticipated debut Come and Get It. How does it work? Entrance to the concert is free, but visitors are required to bring a toy, which will then be given to the Kralupy nad Vltavou orphanage and to refugee children in the Czech Republic....
Rohlik Group has promoted experienced eCommerce manager and Rohlik CZ CEO Olin Novák to the role of International CEO, with this now being his fourth position within the company. Olin Novák will now oversee the day-to-day running of the individual countries of the entire group. Founder and Rohlik Group CEO Tomáš Čupr will now focus more closely on the development of the group as a whole, including increasing efficiencies, along with specific group-wide projects. Rohlik.cz will be newly led by Martin Beháň as of today. As a first step towards making all markets more efficient, Tomáš Čupr centralised operations from all countries where Rohlik Group operates: “We have arrived at a management structure that allows me to focus on much more strategic and valuable issues for the entire Group. We are already one of the most innovative e-commerce companies in Europe, but all who know me know that I already have another milestone in mind.” On Olin Novak’s promotion, he adds: “Olin and I share the same vision of what food retailing of the future should look like, and over the past four years he has proven that he is a true leader made of the same...
The Czech energy company ČEZ has obtained three tenders for the construction of a new unit at the Dukovany nuclear power station, it said on Wednesday. As expected, offers have been made by the French company EDF, KHNP from South Korea and Westinghouse from North America A large digital clock highlighting impending climate disaster has been installed by a metronome on Prague’s Letná Plain. The eight-metre high numerals of the Climate Clock show how much time remains to avert irreversible change to the Earth’s climate. The Chamber of Deputies has approved a bill that will enable Ukrainian soldiers to be trained in Czechia as well as for Czech soldiers to train Ukrainians in other EU member states. The training of Ukrainian troops will take place in the Libavá military zone in Central Moravia. In January, Innogy will raise electricity prices for roughly one-tenth of its customers. This means that from the beginning of the year, this segment of the customer base will pay the government’s capped electricity prices, while the average household will pay about CZK 500 per month more than they do now. While one in ten Czechs borrowed money for Christmas shopping last year,...
By Abigail Calandra – Anglo-American University Gregor Hildebrandt’s exhibition “A Blink of an Eye and the Years are Behind Us” is the first of a series of solo artist installations at Kunsthalle Prague and the most extensive collection of his work to date. The exhibition of more than 80 works is an archive of Hildebrandt’s personal memories, drawing inspiration from music, film, literature, and architecture to create minimalist and abstract impressionist works. Located in Mala Strana, Kunsthalle is a new art space that seeks to highlight Prague’s multicultural past. The German word “kunsthalle” is representative of laboratories of critical thinking and open dialogue about art and society. Kunsthalle Prague opened its doors in February 2022 with the exhibition “Kinetismus: 100 Years of Electricity in Art” to celebrate the building’s original function as the Zenger Electrical Substation in the 1930s. The Berlin-based artist’s work takes up two of three exhibition spaces, including his well-known works, some lesser-known pieces, and site-specific installations. Hildebrandt seeks to document his own life and art while also placing a special focus on the Berlin art and music scene. The exhibition will also serve as a venue for concerts and re-staged Berlin exhibitions, including a performance by...
More than 500 people have signed a petition calling for electricity, water and heat supplies to be cut off to all Russian-owned buildings in Prague, including those used by Moscow’s diplomats, in response to Russia’s massive missile strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. The signatures are being collected in an effort led by a Czech group called Arms for Ukraine. “Over the past several weeks, Ukrainian towns and villages have been hit by unprecedented missile attacks unleashed by Russia,” the group behind the campaign said. The Arms for Ukraine group added: “The main targets have been power plants, heating plants and water systems. This new phase of the war has had disastrous consequences for the daily lives of civilians. Apartments, schools and kindergartens, shops and factories, but also hospitals have been deprived of power and water.” The group called on “state and private energy distributors to give Russian diplomats in Prague a taste of their own medicine,” according to iDNES. “We demand that all Russian-owned buildings be disconnected from gas, water and electricity,” it said. “Let’s give the Russian embassy in Prague a taste of its own medicine,” one of the originators of the petition, Martin Ondráček, wrote on social media. “Let’s show Russian diplomats how it feels to be freezing at night, like...
The Czech Republic’s police have so far accused 49 people of accepting and supporting the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Czech police spokesman Ondrej Moravchik said. Criminal procedures are ongoing in 86 other cases. The police investigate around 300 cases related to Ukraine or Ukrainian refugees. Mr. Moravchik said that about a third of the cases are the so-called cases of approval and support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “86 cases concern the praise of aggression and other similar ways of accepting the murder of Ukrainian civilians,” Moravczik explained to the Czech public radio portal iROZHLAS.cz. The police triggered the investigation on the basis of two articles of Czech criminal law. The possibility of using the provisions to investigate cases of support for Russian aggression was proposed by Prosecutor General Igor Striz shortly after the start of the invasion of Ukraine. According to the General Prosecutor’s Office, any signs of support for Russia’s actions in the attacked country can be prosecuted under sections 365 and 405 of the Czech Republic’s Criminal Code, which sanction the approval of crime and denying, questioning, approving and justifying genocide. Under Czech law, such acts are criminalized and punishable by imprisonment of up to one to...
The standard of living in the Czech Republic declined relative to the European average last year. Gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in purchasing power parity terms fell by two percentage points to 91% of the EU average, putting the Czech Republic on par with Slovenia. Italy is three percentage points above. The minister of labour and social affairs, Marián Jurečka, has proposed increasing the minimum monthly wage by 1,100 crowns to 17,300 crowns from January of next year. The 6.8 percent proposed increase is higher than originally envisaged due to high inflation and predictions that it will continue to rise next year. The proposed hike will now be debated by trade unions and employers’ representatives. Real wages in the Czech Republic are falling the most out of any OECD country since the state was founded, according to an analysis by the company Cyrrus. The analysis shows that real wages fell by 8.3 percent this year and that the average Czech full-time employee would have needed to have saved CZK 40,000 during 2022 to maintain the same standard of living as they previously enjoyed. The Czech Republic will raise its contribution to investments in the programs of the European Space Agency (ESA) to 62 million euros a...
Twelve out of the 21 candidates who registered for the presidential election by the November 8 deadline were dismissed after the interior ministry reviewed the registrations, leaving all the businessmen heavyweights out of the race. All the long-term political favourites remain, and four of the dismissed candidates said they will appeal the decision at the Supreme Administrative Court. The main reason for the dismissal resulted from the verification of the collected signatures in support of the nomination. Candidates were required to present signatures of at least 20 parliamentarians, 10 senators or 50,000 Czech citizens. Businessmen Karel Divis, Tomas Brezina and Karel Janecek presented more than 50,000 signatures from their compatriots, but the ministry rejected too many of these signatures taking the number of signatures on the candidates applications beneath the prescribed threshold. Karel Divis was short by mere 116 signatures after the ministry rejected the incomplete signature files and ran two tests on samples from the remaining 61,438 signatures which yielded 17.847% and 19.765% mistakes rates. “As per the law a particular amount of signatures was deducted from the overall number of valid signatures and the result of Mr. Karel Divis is 49,884”, said head of the electoral department at the interior...
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