Velika Plana

Velika Plana Велика Плана
Town and municipality
Administration building
Flag Coat of arms
Location of the municipality of Velika Plana within Serbia
Coordinates: 44°20′N 21°05′E / 44.333°N 21.083°E / 44.333; 21.083Coordinates: 44°20′N 21°05′E / 44.333°N 21.083°E / 44.333; 21.083
Country	Serbia
Region	Southern and Eastern Serbia
District	Podunavlje
Settlements	13
Government
• Mayor	Igor Matkovic
• President of the Municipal Assembly	Dalibor Todorovic
Area
• Municipality	345 km2 (133 sq mi)
Population (2011 census)
• Town	16,078
• Municipality	40,578
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code	11320
Area code	+381 26
Car plates	VP
Website	www.velikaplana.org.rs

Velika Plana (Serbian Cyrillic: Велика Плана, pronounced [ʋêlikaː plǎːna]) is a town and municipality located in the Podunavlje District of the eastern Serbia. In 2011, the population of the municipality is 40,578 (i.e. in the town proper, 16,078 inhabitants). It is estimated that about 5,500-6,500 IDP's from Kosovo & Metohija also live in Velika Plana but are unregistered. It lies on the left bank of Velika Morava, at a distance of 4 kilometres (2 miles) from the town centre.

The main Serbian motorway from Subotica to Niš goes by the town. The town is also an important railroad junction. Twin tracks go south toward Niš, a track goes west to Belgrade, and a track goes north to Mala Krsna junction, where it splits towards Belgrade, Smederevo and Požarevac. This, in combination with the fact that many bus lines form southern Serbia to Belgrade and Vojvodina make a stop at the town bus station, makes Velika Plana an important transportation hub of central Serbia.

The origins of industry in Velika Plana is connected to its agricultural environment and starts in the 1880s. Before World War II, there were three slaughterhouses-meat processing plants here, first that of Italian citizen of German origin Toni Klefiš (Tony Klefisch), and later that of Germans Christian Scheuß and Wilhelm Schumacher, and the one whose stocks were owned by a group of three larger and seven smaller Serbian entrepreneurs.

After WW II, all this property was nationalised and unified into a huge plant, expanding to include all sorts of food and food-related production, all the way to clothes and duvets with goose down. These have, however, folded in the 1990s with the disastrous events concurrent with the breakdown of ex-Yugoslavia.