Impact Stories

Think Globally, Act “Locally Controlled”

Apr 15 2013 - 12:09pm

Diji Chandrasekharan Behr, a Natural Resource Economist at PROFOR, sent in this blog from the UNFF-10 Conference in Istanbul. At the ongoing UNFF 10 meetings in Istanbul, discussions have focused on how to finance sustainable forest management. While the UNFF 10 discussions are at an international level, the questions asked are similar to the ones posed by small forest holders and communities: How to obtain financing for sustainable management of their community forest, forest farms or woodlot? Locally controlled forestry presents a real opportunity for reducing poverty and sharing...

Films for tree-huggers

Apr 11 2013 - 12:13pm

PROFOR's manager, Peter Dewees, is attending UNFF 10 in Istanbul this week. He mentioned "brilliant and inspiring films" that were presented at a side-event on Forest Heroes, produced in some cases by very young (Sébastien Pins is 23) and talented film-makers. For those of us who did not make it, here are the movies now, in alphabetical order: Amazing Grace by Rowan Pybus, South Africa An Unseen World by Paul Rosolie, USA Feel like a Mountain by Elio Alonso Vasquez Miranda, Peru Ma forêt by Sébastien Pins, Belgium Reynaldo by Dan Childs & Nick...

Toward forest-friendly growth in Brazil, the Congo Basin and Indonesia

Mar 11 2013 - 12:04pm

The forest transition theory holds that economic growth and deforestation go hand in hand. What is happening in the Amazon, in the Congo Basin and in Indonesia does not necessarily follow that model. A seminar on forest-friendly growth in the three major tropical forest areas, held at the World Bank on February 28, 2013, gave the following food for thought. Historically deforestation rates have accompanied rural economic growth but the scenario is different in Brazil. In part because of the government's efforts to limit deforestation by improving law enforcement, and in part because...

Lessons from the Establishment of a Timber Chain of Custody System in Liberia

Feb 28 2013 - 1:59pm

River Cess County, Liberia – Timber! A large valuable tree is felled in a tropical forest in Liberia once logged over for war profit. Soon after Prince Logan, a 34-year old chainsaw operator, deals the final blow to a tall Lovoa tree, creating daylight as the tree crashes through dense neighboring vegetation, Apollo Barcon, a 39-year old felling clerk, scrambles over vines and branches with a clipboard in hand. Barcon’s job is to apply a barcode and record the tree on a tree data form which will help track the log all the way from the stump to the point of export. That tracking...

Good Business: Making Private Investment Benefit Tropical Forests

Jan 15 2013 - 6:13pm

Issue 54 of ETFRN News: Good Business: Making Private Investment Benefit Tropical Forests, published by Tropenbos International in January 2013, presents a compelling case for revisiting business as usual. As policy-makers and private actors redefine their strategy to seize opportunities and manage the risks associated with emerging forest-related markets, these articles demonstrate that well targeted investments can yield economic, social and environmental benefits. The collection groups articles in five categories: large-scale investments small-scale forestry, catalyzing...

A guide to investing in locally controlled forestry

Jan 11 2013 - 10:48am

In a newly published guide, author Dominic Elson starts from the premise that people should not be seen simply as "labor" or people who are in the way of "capital" and need to be paid off, but rather co-investors in the creation of wealth from forest investments. At COFO, back in September 2012, he sat down with PROFOR to explain this paradigm shift (see diagram and video interviews here). The Guide to Investing in Locally Controlled Forestry was published in January by The Growing Forest Partnerships initiative, in association with FAO, IIED, IUCN, The Forests Dialogue...

Green gold for Gabon?

Nov 8 2012 - 4:19pm

Contributed by Kirsten Hund, Senior Mining Specialist at the World Bank (Oil, gas and mining policy division) and formerly Regional Extractive Industries Coordinator for WWF Central Africa, based in Libreville. Kirsten is co-director of the Artisanal and Small Scale Mining in Protected Areas and Critical Ecosystems project (ASM-PACE), supported by PROFOR, and co-author of the study on ASM-PACE Global Solutions. Photos of gold miners: left, by Micha Hollestelle; right, by WWF. More photos “Artisanal miners are poor exploited human beings who are forced to dig for minerals under...

What Constitutes a "Fair Share of the Pie"?

Nov 1 2012 - 5:52pm

On September 27, 2012, during World Forest Week, PROFOR and FAO co-organized a panel discussion entitled "A Fair Share of the Pie," which brought together experts looking at the issue of benefit sharing. The session provided an opportunity to discuss and share ideas about ways of establishing partnerships and effective benefit sharing arrangements. It presented insights on how to share benefits and create incentives for REDD+ and sustainable forest management through partnerships involving communities and the public and private sectors. We reproduce below some of the Questions and...

The Results Are In: Assessing Forest Governance in Russia

Oct 15 2012 - 3:37pm

The results of a diagnostic exercise, which took place in four pilot regions of Russia in early 2012 with funding from the United Kingdom government, are now available online, both in English and Russian, complete with artfully-presented data and analysis. Based on this initial exercise, Russia’s aggregated forest governance score would be 65%-- a passing grade according to the report's authors: “Taking into account the most challenging recent years of forest reforms in the Russian Federation, this result may be deemed fairly good.” Besides identifying key forest...

Insights and highlights from a week of PPTs

Oct 5 2012 - 3:25pm

Powerpoints and speeches delivered during COFO21 and World Forest Week could fill an entire academic course load. Many sessions ran in parallel in the labyrinth-like FAO building in Rome. Here is a very short selection of the work that caught our eye. First off, a diagram. Can someone please create a T-shirt based on this idea?! "Rights holders are not people who are in the way. They are central to the economy," explained Dominic Elson, author of the diagram and a Guide to Investing in Locally Controlled Forestry, forthcoming. The guide was being launched at COFO21 on...

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