ZVEZA RADIOAMATERJEV SLOVENIJE

Zveza radioamaterjev Slovenije - ZRS (Association of Radio Amateurs of Slovenia) in fact it is not such a young organization, as it was established in 1946 and operated within the Yugoslav Association of Radio Amateurs as a voluntary and active member until December 1991, when it withdrew from membership. In February 1992 ZRS began the procedure for admission into the International Amateur Radio Union and was admitted into full membership in December 1992. When Slovenia became a member of the International Telecommunications Union, Slovene radio amateurs obtained new call signs - S5, which began to be used on 24th October 1992.

The Association of Radio Amateurs of Slovenia unites more than 2,500 members (of total 8,000) organized in 117 radio clubs. It is interesting to compare the number of operators with the total population and area of the Republic of Slovenia - every 250rd Slovene is a radio amateur - operator and, on average, one radio amateur - operator covers near 3 sq.km.

The ZRS is a registered organization operating in the field of technical culture and functioning in accordance with its statute. Its activities are directed by managing bodies typical in such organizations. Almost 100% of the Association's budget is contributed by its members in the form of a membership fee/operator license fee, which currently amounts to 40 EUR per year. Families with several operators pay only 50% of the regular membership fee! ZRS also issues its official journal "CQ ZRS" in 2.000 copies. Its contents are, of course, adapted to suit the interests of members: internal news, operator techniques and DX information, HF and VHF/UHF/SHF contests, amateur radio direction finding, techniques and design, ham exchange, etc. We have started to exchange our journal with some IARU members and it would please us greatly if this exchange could be extended also to other IARU members. The activities of Slovene radio amateurs in international competitions are probably well known and we will certainly do our best at major contests to improve our standings on the top lists. This will be the main objective of members of the established Slovenia Contest Club.

The S5 PACKET RADIO network operates at more than 50 locations (BBS and Nodes with more than 100 stations and computers). Most are home made (broad - band stations, up to 1.2288 Mbps, operating on 6m, 2m, 70 cm, 23 cm, 13 cm and 9 cm). Almost 2,000 ZRS operators are engaged in digital communications. The first high speed link (1.2288 Mbps) on 2.4 GHz, developed by S53MV, was set out in June 1995.

The QSL BUREAU at ZRS has been operating independently since 1991 and, in our opinion, quite successfully. We hope that IARU members share our opinion.

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