Financing Sustainable Forestry: Issues Under International Deliberation

Joshi, Mahendra 1999
UNDP Programme on Forests and the Intergovernmental forum on forests Secretariat

Many aspects of policy deliberations on financial issues can be greatly advanced by clarifying the underlying economic complexities in financing forestry operations. This background document has been prepared to facilitate the discussion of Intergovernmental Forum on Forests (IFF) Programme Element II.a: 'The Need for Financial Resources', at its Third Session (3-14 May 1999, Geneva). It describes the findings of two recently concluded studies prepared for the UNDP Programme on Forests:

Financial Mechanisms for Sustainable Forestry and

An Assessment of Data on ODA Financial Flows in the Forest Sector.

Following a brief review of existing environmental and forest funds, such as the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the Bali Partnership Fund, this paper fosters the current debate of global externalities associated with forests in the context of a International Forest Fund. This international forest fund system will contrast sharply with the decentralised and uncoordinated system of financial cooperation that currently exists in the development community. Additionally, given the importance of the private sector, an innovative investment promotion entity is proposed in this paper, to draw upon public resources and to leverage private support for a variety of commercial and non-commercial activities towards SFM, including those in low forest-cover countries.