Program SummaryThis PROFOR activity aims to assess the strengths and limitations of Myanmar’s forest sector, with specific emphasis on the National Restoration and Reforestation Program and its community forestry aspects. The Government of Myanmar has issued very clear targets and actions to achieve large scale restoration and reforestation, which form the cornerstone of the national climate change response agenda and Myanmar’s contribution to global climate change mitigation. This activity will be part of a larger country analytical work, the Country Environmental Assessment (CEA), which…
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CHALLENGESri Lanka is highly vulnerable to natural hazards, including floods, droughts, and landslides, which are exacerbated by population growth, urbanization, uncontrolled land-use change, and deforestation. The World Bank is implementing several programs to improve the government’s resilience to such natural risks. Notably, the Climate Resilience Improvement Project (CRIP) aims to reduce the immediate physical risks, such as by stabilizing hillsides with concrete, nets and drainage pipes, and to improve the understanding of disaster risks so that future investments are effectively…
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CHALLENGEAround 1.3 billion people – most of them living on less than $1.25 a day - rely on forests for some part of their livelihood. However, detailed, country-specific data is still lacking when it comes to forests’ socio-economic contributions and their role in poverty alleviation. Without this information, forests may be overlooked in national development strategies. This activity aims to contribute to knowledge on forest’s contribution to movements out of poverty by using a new and innovative approach to forest-poverty data collection.APPROACHA new tool, Forest-SWIFT (Survey of…
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A Review of Conceptual Understandings and Practical ExperiencesCHALLENGEWhile many international agreements, governments, private sector companies and civil society organizations have committed to implement both an ecosystem approach and sustainable forest management (SFM), there is a general lack of clarity on how these two concepts relate to each other. As a result, delegates to international fora on forest and forest-related issues have many different interpretations as to whether and how an ecosystem approach and SFM relate to each other.APPROACHIn response to challenges arising from this…
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CHALLENGEMore than 70 percent of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa depends on forests and woodlands for its livelihood; one fifth of rural families’ daily needs come from forests. Woodlands and forests supply approximately 60 percent of all energy. Forest-related activities accounts for a large part of the GDP of most of the continent’s countries. And, Africa is home to 25 percent of the world’s remaining rainforests.Despite significant international financial support to the forestry sector in the Sub-Saharan African countries, impacts on sustainable management and poverty alleviation are…
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CHALLENGE An emerging body of analytic work has demonstrated the linkage between poverty, armed conflict, and weak state governance. States which exemplify this nexus of human vulnerability and state failure are often referred to as ‘fragile states’-- those failing, whether for lack of capacity or political will, to perform core functions of delivering basic services and protecting the security of its citizens.There are strong correlations between state fragility, conflict, and the means by which natural resources such as forests are managed by the state. When resource rents and concession…
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CHALLENGEAfrica’s forests, landscapes, and ecosystems contribute to poverty alleviation and shared prosperity by providing goods and services that sustain the livelihoods of the rural poor and contribute raw materials to other economic sectors. In sub-Saharan Africa, investments in programs for reduced emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+), have catalyzed a vibrant and inclusive dialogue on opportunities and tradeoffs related to landscape and forest issues. Combined, these efforts are building consensus on the role of forests, how they can contribute to sustained…
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CHALLENGEThe agricultural sector in many countries is identified as a driver of deforestation. It also, in some countries, offers opportunities for increasing the adoption of trees on farms (e.g., through farmer-managed natural regeneration and agroforestry). Stakeholders in the public, private, and nongovernmental sectors are undertaking initiatives to reduce the impact of commodity value chains on forests, presenting a real learning opportunity. For example, Brazil’s Soy Moratorium was the first voluntary zero-deforestation agreement implemented in the tropics, and it set the stage for…
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In May 2004, PROFOR sponsored a policy workshop "Forests: A Resource for Development" in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. The purpose of the workshop was to disseminate the experiences of recent forest sector reforms from other countries in Latin America and the world to policy-makers, legislators, academics, non-governmental organizations, private companies, and rural forest producers and their associations. The aim of the workshop was to aid the implementation of the new forest policy framework embodied in the proposed forest legislation by presenting successful experiences and lessons from…
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Support to Forest Sector Reform in Kenya, 2004-2005CHALLENGEA combination of corruption and illegal excisions in the latter half of the 1990s reduced the area of industrial plantations in Kenya government forest reserves from 160,000 hectares to about 120,000 hectares. These forest excisions have created major environmental, economic and social problems. Illegal logging in indigenous forests has mushroomed and is negatively impacting on the biodiversity and the vital water catchment protection functions of Kenya's remaining upland forests.Further, uncertainties about the possibility to…
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