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  • At GLF Climate, youth shared 13 sustainable forestry innovations for the Asia-Pacific region

At GLF Climate, youth shared 13 sustainable forestry innovations for the Asia-Pacific region


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More than ever, forests and trees are called upon to address the great global challenges of our times, among which are: climate change, deforestation, forest degradation, biodiversity erosion, poverty and food insecurity. Innovative technologies – including digital technologies, biological technologies, technical innovations in processes and products, innovative finance and social innovations – hold a huge potential to advance sustainable forest management and help address these challenges, globally and in the Asia-Pacific region. However, technology adoption has been slow and uneven in the region. As technology enthusiasts, forest guardians and forest managers of tomorrow, young people have a leading role to play in generating momentum and revolutionizing institutions from within to support the uptake and scaling-up of innovative technologies in Asia and the Pacific.

This is why, on Friday, 5 Nov. 2021, FAO and the CGIAR Research Programme on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) co-organized a session highlighting youth perspectives on innovative forest technologies. This event attracted over 400 attendees and was part of the GLF Climate hybrid conference, “Frontiers of Change.” “Instead of another meeting to exchange on the global and pressing issues, we wanted, during this event, to focus on innovative solutions and share a note of optimism and hope” said Vincent Gitz (CIFOR), FTA Director.

On behalf of FAO, Rao Matta, Forestry Officer, highlighted the important role innovation can play to make the forest sector more attractive to young people. He invited the youth to become “innovation champions,” to play a pivotal role in scaling-up innovative technologies, and to bring their unique forward-looking and out-of-the-box thinking perspectives to the discussion table. “FAO,” he said, “is fully committed to promote the visibility of youth and of their seminal work”.

During this event, FAO and FTA gave the floor to students and young professionals involved in the forest sector in Asia and the Pacific, to hear some of their ideas to unleash the potential offered by innovative technologies to advance sustainable forest management. 13 young people, aged 18–35, from nine different countries of the Asia-Pacific region who were selected by FAO and CIFOR after an open call for contributions presented their works in 3 minutes each.

Their talks illustrated, in various contexts, the huge potential of innovative forest technologies to advance sustainable forestry and sustainable forest management. Together, the guest speakers covered a broad range of topics, showing how technologies — both new and repurposed — can improve and facilitate monitoring and reporting, strengthen citizen engagement in forest monitoring and management and support process and product innovations in the forest sector in the Asia-Pacific region. These ideas are also inspiring globally and in other contexts.

YOU CAN REPLAY THE FULL EVENT HERE

The presentations gave way to a lively session of questions and answers with the audience. The back-and-forth discussions revealed some of the barriers to uptake and scale innovative technologies. These blockages include: (i) the limited internet connection in rural or remote areas; (ii) the high level of upfront investments that may be required for technology adoption, including for equipment, infrastructure development, capacity-building and involvement of local communities. Participants also noted that restrictive or rigid policies and regulations often lag far behind the quick evolution of innovative technologies, which can hamper their use and dissemination. For instance, current policies and rules may not allow the use of data collected by remote sensing methods in official statistics or as forensic evidence. Concluding this event, Rao Matta, indicated  that intensive, follow-up actions will be organized at country level, probably next year. Young experts will once again be invited to share their experience and views on sustainable innovations for the Asia-Pacific.

To access the 13 video presentations, please follow the links below:

Session 1: How can innovative technologies improve and facilitate monitoring?

  1. Shahrukh Kamran (Pakistan): Development, testing and implementation of insect-catching drones.
  2. Kyuho Lee (Republic of Korea): Drones for planning and monitoring forest ecosystem restoration: towards a forest degradation index
  3. Angga Saputra (Indonesia): Estimating tree height, canopy cover and tree diameter using unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology.
  4. Cecille de Jesus (the Philippines): Follow the water: advanced technologies for demonstrating forest-water-community relationships.
  5. Thuan Sarzynski (Vietnam): Google Earth Engine, an innovative technology for forest conservation.
  6. Marie Jessica Gabriel (the Philippines): Spatial Monitoring And Reporting Tool (SMART).

Session 2: How can innovative technologies facilitate the engagement of civil society, local communities, smallholders and youth?

  1. Sony Lama (Nepal): Forest Watcher: employing citizen science in forest management of Nepal.
  2. Nur Bahar (Malaysia): How to effectively engage youth in satellite-based tropical forest monitoring?
  3. June Mandawali (Papua New Guinea): Community Based Tree Nurseries in Ramu/Markham Valley of Papua New Guinea.

Session 3: How can innovative technologies support optimization of processes and products for sustainable forest management?

  1. Sanjayaraj Tamang (Nepal): Invasive species management in Nepal: a pathway to sustainable forest management.
  2. Clarence Gio S. Almoite (the Philippines): Building back Philippine biodiversity through geotagging mother tree species for modernized and mechanized forest nurseries.
  3. Prachi Gupta (India): Advances in the wood anatomical studies with innovations in microscopy.
  4. Deasy Ramatia (Indonesia): Binderless particleboard: production process and self- bonding mechanisms.
Download the PDF!

All of these 3-minute presentations have been developed in detailed scientific articles and gathered in a FAO and FTA co-publication entitled, Innovative forestry for a sustainable future. Youth contributions from Asia and the Pacific.

This youth publication is part of a broader roadmap jointly developed by FAO and FTA on innovative forest technologies in the Asia-Pacific region.

Click here for more information on this roadmap process.

 

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Petén’s community forest concessions: A pillar of forest conservation and livelihoods development in Guatemala


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Joint FTA/PIM research has generated scientific evidence of the socio-economic performance of community forest concessions in the Maya Biosphere Reserve (MBR) in Petén, Guatemala, which has informed technical documents and the revision of the technical norms for concession renewal by Guatemala's Council for Protected Areas (CONAP) in September 2019 as well as the first renewal of a community concession contract (Cooperative Carmelita) in December 2019. The study, led by Bioversity/ICRAF and carried out in close collaboration with CIFOR, Rainforest Alliance, the Association of Forest Communities of Petén (ACOFOP) and local partners, covered all 12 community forest concessions with an area of about 400,000 ha. Photo by FTA/PIM
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FTA-PIM research documents show strong benefits of community forest concessions

A quarter-century-long experiment with community forest concessions in the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala’s Petén region has become a shining example of how community stewardship of tropical forests can contribute to forest conservation and livelihoods development. Yet as concession contracts come up for renewal,[1] competing interests such as cattle ranching, tourism, oil exploitation and drug trafficking could threaten this model of success.

Established in 1990, the Maya Biosphere Reserve is the largest protected area in Central America. Forty percent of its area has been set aside as a Multiple Use Zone to promote sustainable forest use. Starting in the second half of the 1990s, 12 community forest concessions were granted to local communities for 25 years, covering an area of about 400,000 ha. Each concession is operated by a community forest enterprise (CFE), which extracts timber and non-timber forest products sustainably, as documented by FSC certification.

Joint research under the CGIAR Research Programs on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA) and on Policies, Institutions and Markets (PIM) published in 2019 shows that communities can skillfully manage and conserve forests while strengthening livelihoods and generating other benefits. In the nine active concessions,[2] which together occupy more than 350,000 ha, deforestation rates were close to zero (0.1% per year), compared to 1% per year in the core zone and 5.5% per year in the buffer zone. In these concessions, sustainable forest management has allowed CFE member households to move out of extreme poverty – and numerous households out of poverty altogether. Forest-based income has contributed to improved housing, education and health, and overall livelihoods development.

“Petén’s community forest concessions represent a model of forest governance that shows how granting long-term forest resource use rights to local communities can lead to substantial benefits for both forest conservation and local livelihoods,” said Dietmar Stoian, a scientist with World Agroforestry (ICRAF, one of FTA’s managing partners) and lead author of the above-mentioned analysis of the socioeconomic performance of the community forest enterprises.

Findings from the analysis of the active and inactive concessions informed the technical norms for concession renewal by Guatemala’s Council for Protected Areas (CONAP) in September 2019, as well as the first renewal of a community concession contract (Cooperative Carmelita) in December 2019. The analysis was led by The Alliance of Bioversity and CIAT/ICRAF and carried out in close collaboration with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR, FTA’s lead managing partner), Rainforest Alliance, the Association of Forest Communities of Petén (ACOFOP, and other local partners.

Widespread interest and engagement

The attention paid to the evolution and outcomes of the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala and globally has been substantial, as has been the mobilization of resources – financial, human and political – in support of it.

“There has been significant support from international cooperation and development agencies, and the results have generated widespread interest,” said Iliana Monterroso, a scientist at CIFOR and co-author of the study.

At the same time, there are threats to the continuity of the community forest concessions, as more CFEs await the renewal of their contracts over the next few years. Large-scale tourism development in the northern part of the reserve, for example, may compromise the viability of some concessions, as tourism advocates claim that timber extraction by local communities is not compatible with tourism in that part of the reserve. These advocates are behind a bill which is currently before the US Senate, that would fund a project on the Mirador Mayan archaeological site that could result in depriving the communities of their rights to sustainably harvest timber. This could affect five concessions areas, leaving them with fewer livelihood options (as the envisioned type of tourism will largely benefit external tour operators and private investors).

Vice News recently issued an interesting documentary on this case:




“This is one of the principal conflicts over land in the reserve, along with interests in expanding the area under cattle ranching and intensifying oil exploration,” said Stoian.

“An ongoing study supported by PIM will shed further light into the political economy underlying these conflicts, and explore responses from community organizations to thwart non-science-based counter-narratives put forward by powerful groups in support of their vested interests,” added Monterroso, who is leading the study.

To share their research findings and discuss implications, ICRAF and CIFOR, together with Rainforest Alliance and ACOFOP, organized two key events in 2019 around the World Bank Land & Poverty Conference in Washington.

Scientists from CIFOR were then invited to contribute to the 2020 Human Development Report for Guatemala, led by the United Nations Development Programme. This was the first time the report used a territorial approach for analyzing challenges to development. And in another panel on innovating finance for sustainable landscapes organized by FTA at the Global Landscapes Forum in Luxembourg, ACOFOP’s Maria Teresita Chinchilla Miranda shared details on the successful FSC-certified management of over 500,000 hectares of forest in the Mayan Biosphere Reserve.




ACOFOP’s commercial services branch, Community Enterprise for Forest Services (FORESCOM), was also invited to the panel following an interview wiith FTA partner Tropenbos that highlighted its various successes.[3]

CFEs now generate USD 5 million annually. With the support of ACOFOP, some community enterprises and FTA partner CATIE, FORESCOM set up a new community fund that offers member organizations flexible loans with lower interest rates than commercial banks.

Invitations to share the findings at the XXV IUFRO World Congress in Brazil (late 2019) and ACOFOP’s 30th anniversary (early 2020) triggered further debate around the future of the Maya Biosphere Reserve. And some countries, such as Indonesia, Colombia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, are looking to this case to inform their own approaches in support of community forestry.

Strengthened cooperation after years of conflict

The development of the community forest concessions in Guatemala has been characterized by collective action and adaptive management. Given the diverse stakeholder groups in Petén, the degree of cooperation is all the more remarkable.

“I haven’t seen anything like this level of collaboration,” said Monterroso. “Because the model arose out of Guatemala’s peace agreements following decades of civil war, and because the concession system grants land management rights, the communities were able to organize around the specific needs of their diverse membership base. They demonstrated their capacity to do this sustainably, managing the forest for community profit without negatively affecting the environment, and developing their own mechanisms to ensure common values despite their different interests.”

The nine active CFEs were able to adapt to dynamic changes, based on different legal entities (civil society, association, cooperative and corporation) and management models. Over time, these CFEs have seen their membership grow, their staff gain business management skills, and the diversity and value of their assets grow – along with the perceived benefits for CFE members and local communities. CFEs continue working to ensure equal access to benefits for men and women members, building capacities, promoting affirmative actions such as introducing explicit rules in membership and decision-making spaces, and diversifying their engagement in value chains that also allow for the participation of women and youth.

“In a context that is highly dynamic, these CFEs have shown resilience under the constant external pressures that threaten to undermine not only their livelihoods but also their successful conservation outcomes,” said Monterroso.

Mahogany: sustainable and lucrative

The availability of precious woods has been a key factor in sustaining the economic viability of the community concessions. During 2012–2016, timber sales generated a total gross income of around USD 24.7 million, with an average of 74% of that coming from sales of mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla). Although the region is rich in other tree species, FSC-certified mahogany generates the highest returns by far. Since the species is listed in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), Petén’s CFEs have a competitive advantage in the international market when offering certified sawn wood from this species. Sales from the certified concessions also rose for non-timber products like xate (Chamaedorea palm), whose fronds are used in flower arrangements.

The CFEs have used the profits from these sales (along with better access to credit and financing) to consolidate their operations, to invest in the effective control of human-generated fires and wildfires, and to create internal financing mechanisms for small-scale start-ups like carpentry and handicrafts as well as microcredit schemes. These CFEs have also been able to overcome barriers to investments, with positive outcomes at the community and forest levels.

At the household level, forest income contributes an average of 38% of household income in the nine active CFEs. Annual forest-based income varies widely between USD 500 and USD 10,000 per household, but most CFE members have been able to move out of poverty, reinvesting that income into health, education, and other livelihood assets.

“All children of these households are benefitting from some form of formal education and are much more likely than their parents to attend high school,” said Stoian. “This allows them to search out alternative livelihood options, including management positions in the CFEs and other endeavors linked to forest conservation through sustainable operations in the Maya Biosphere Reserve.”

Overall CFE membership saw a rise of 26% between 2000 and 2017, with some CFEs providing specific incentives for women to become a member. The study also found that women have increased their participation in the active CFEs over the past two decades, either through involvement in the processing of non-timber forest products such as xate or breadnut, or through their engagement in CFE management or their boards of trustees.

“This analysis shows how community enterprises are able to sustainably generate forest income, reinvest it, and gain access to local and external financing. This allowed them to diversify their activities, add value, develop new products and place them into timber and non-timber forest product value chains,” said Stoian and Monterroso, who are committed to supporting the forest communities and the process of concession renewal through science-based evidence and engagement with stakeholders from public and private sectors and civil society.

They conclude that the evidence of both environmental and socioeconomic performance by the community concessions makes a strong case for concession renewal.

 “With five of FTA’s seven partners involved in addition to PIM, this body of research highlights the value added of the strong collaboration among FTA partners, with other CGIAR Research Programs, and with national and local partners” remarked Vincent Gitz, Director of FTA.

[1] The first concession contracts came up for renewal in 2019.

[2] In 2009, the National Council of Protected Areas (CONAP), the authority in charge of the Maya Biosphere Reserve, terminated the concession contract of two CFEs and suspended the management plan of a third due to noncompliance with the stipulations. These inactive concessions reflect the disadvantage they had at the onset of the devolution process in view of limited concession areas (about 50,000 ha across the three concessions), lack of high-value timber, and livelihood trajectories based on agriculture rather than forest activities.

[3] As a result of the Tropenbos interview series and the GLF Luxembourg event, FTA has released a publication on innovative finance for sustainable landscapes illustrated by the example of ACOFOP.

This article was written by Erin O’Connell.

This article was produced by the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). FTA is the world’s largest research for development program to enhance the role of forests, trees and agroforestry in sustainable development and food security and to address climate change. CIFOR leads FTA in partnership with ICRAF, the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, CATIE, CIRAD, INBAR and TBI. FTA’s work is supported by the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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  • What’s good for business is good for forests in Indonesia

What’s good for business is good for forests in Indonesia

21 March, 2019

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FTA COMMUNICATIONS TEAM
A community member hold a tree product as part of the Kanoppi project in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. Photo by A. Sanjaya/CIFOR

Scientists in Indonesia are demonstrating how better business opportunities for local communities can help foster and reinforce sustainable forest management.

As the world marks International Day of Forests on March 21, the benefits of reforestation and forest restoration are rightly lauded. In success stories of the past, local communities have often been cast as the heroes of sustainable forestry, while private sector businesses have been portrayed as villains. But what if that’s not the whole story?

The Kanoppi project, which launched in 2013 and has now entered its second phase, concentrates on the expansion of market-based agroforestry and the development of integrated landscape management in the poorest provinces of eastern Indonesia and the country’s most densely-populated island of Java.

The project, which is part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA), is funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) and led by scientists from the World Agroforestry (ICRAF), Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), the Research, Development and Innovation Agency (FOERDIA) of the Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry and Murdoch University in collaboration with other project partners.

Read also: New children’s book teaches the sustainable traditions of West Timorese honey hunters

Missing link

For many generations, communities living in Indonesia have relied on forests to supplement the food and income they reap from farming. Yet, despite the riches of the forests, poverty is still widespread. Some rural households living in the Kanoppi project’s pilot sites in eastern Indonesia earn around US$210 a year.

Part of the challenge is a lack of integration and linkages between community groups producing timber and non-timber forest products (NTFP) and the private sector. Conflicting, confusing and changeable public policies also do not help.

“For example, some communities will plant small teak plantations as a kind of savings account, but most don’t know how to get the permits required to harvest and transport the timber,” explained Ani Adiwinata Nawir, policy scientist with CIFOR. “This means that communities do not harvest as much teak as they could and that they can’t convert their timber into cash when needed.”

Strengthening value chains has become a key focus for Kanoppi, so that farmers can capture more value from their agroforestry production. This, however, requires sustained efforts at multiple levels, including promoting better practices on the ground to increase productivity and profitability, developing markets and private sector engagement, and facilitating supportive policies and institutions.

People work together in a paddy in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Photo by A. Erlangga/CIFOR

Protecting the forest

One example of how to turn traditional community practices into a successful business venture comes from the Mount Mutis Nature Reserve in West Timor. Here, communities come together every year to harvest wild forest honey. The task is dangerous – men scale trees of up to 80 meters to collect the honey by hand – but it is also sustainable because it does not require cutting down trees.

The honey supplements local diets, and there is enough left over to sell. In fact, as much as 30 tons of wild honey is produced and harvested in Mt. Mutis annually, accounting for 25 percent of total production in the province. Working collaboratively with WWF Indonesia – which is one of the project’s NGO partners along with others like Threads of Life – Kanoppi has helped brand and package the honey, which is now sold as “Mt. Mutis honey” and sold to neighboring islands.

Similarly on Sumbawa island, this commercial success is good news for communities and for the forest: Because the continued honey production hinges on a healthy ecosystem, people have a strong economic incentive to preserve and protect the forest.

That’s the underlying logic of the whole project. When communities can successfully market and sell sustainable products, their incentive to continue sustainable forestry practices grows, which in turn increases productivity, profitability and incomes.

“We want to reinforce this virtuous cycle where business opportunities foster sustainable forestry,” said Aulia Perdana, a marketing specialist with ICRAF. “That’s why we try to involve the private sector – for example in the village learning centers we’ve established in project sites – so that communities can better connect with the market.”

Other efforts to promote sustainable and profitable agroforestry production include using voluntary extensionists, meaning that the people who first adopt a new technology help spread those innovations to other members of the community. Eleven on-farm demonstration trials have already been established, and 40 more are planned for 2019. Kanoppi has also published manuals, journal articles, videos and a picture book to promote its methodology.

Read the picture book: Secrets of the Mutis Honey Hunters

Landscape perspective

Given the project’s success with marketing the sustainably produced honey from Mt. Mutis, the local district administration has adapted its strategy on integrated landscape-level management of NTFP to give greater weight to communities’ customary practices. This is an important first step toward establishing policy support elsewhere in the country.

Honeycomb drains through a nylon filter in Indonesia. Photo by S. Purnama Sarie/ICRAF

One challenge has been that past planning and policies have separately focused on different sectors, such as small farms in forestry and target-oriented cash crop production led by other sectors – not considering opportunities for synergies or problematic overlaps. Kanoppi has departed from that approach.

“We talk about integrated landscape management, which essentially is about harmonizing the different land uses along the watershed from upstream to downstream, so that farms, plantations, forests and many other kinds of activities coexist and reinforce each other,” said Ani.

“The landscape perspective helps everyone – communities, businesses and authorities – see what kind of production fits where in the landscape, in ways that are both profitable and sustainable.”

Kanoppi is a clear example of how combining the expertise and experience of CIFOR and ICRAF scientists makes for a strong response to development and sustainability challenges in forested landscapes – among the many reasons why the two institutions recently announced a merger.

In Indonesia, Ani, Perdana and their colleagues will continue their work to develop inclusive, sustainable business models that generate a fair return – specifically focusing on scaling-up the adoption of improved production practices and value chains to benefit smallholder livelihoods through landscape-scale management of the farm-forest interface – for communities and for forests.

By Marianne Gadeberg, communications specialist.

This research is part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). FTA is the world’s largest research for development program to enhance the role of forests, trees and agroforestry in sustainable development and food security and to address climate change. CIFOR leads FTA in partnership with Bioversity International, CATIE, CIRAD, INBAR, ICRAF and TBI. FTA’s work is supported by the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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What’s good for business is good for forests in Indonesia


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A community member holds a tree product as part of the Kanoppi project in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. Photo by A. Sanjaya/CIFOR
Posted by

FTA COMMUNICATIONS TEAM

Scientists in Indonesia are demonstrating how better business opportunities for local communities can help foster and reinforce sustainable forest management.

As the world marks International Day of Forests on March 21, the benefits of reforestation and forest restoration are rightly lauded. In success stories of the past, local communities have often been cast as the heroes of sustainable forestry, while private sector businesses have been portrayed as villains. But what if that’s not the whole story?

The Kanoppi project, which launched in 2013 and has now entered its second phase, concentrates on the expansion of market-based agroforestry and the development of integrated landscape management in the poorest provinces of eastern Indonesia and the country’s most densely-populated island of Java.

The project, which is part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA), is funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) and led by scientists from the World Agroforestry (ICRAF), Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), the Research, Development and Innovation Agency (FOERDIA) of the Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry and Murdoch University in collaboration with other project partners.

Read also: New children’s book teaches the sustainable traditions of West Timorese honey hunters

Missing link

For many generations, communities living in Indonesia have relied on forests to supplement the food and income they reap from farming. Yet, despite the riches of the forests, poverty is still widespread. Some rural households living in the Kanoppi project’s pilot sites in eastern Indonesia earn around US$210 a year.

Part of the challenge is a lack of integration and linkages between community groups producing timber and non-timber forest products (NTFP) and the private sector. Conflicting, confusing and changeable public policies also do not help.

“For example, some communities will plant small teak plantations as a kind of savings account, but most don’t know how to get the permits required to harvest and transport the timber,” explained Ani Adiwinata Nawir, policy scientist with CIFOR. “This means that communities do not harvest as much teak as they could and that they can’t convert their timber into cash when needed.”

Strengthening value chains has become a key focus for Kanoppi, so that farmers can capture more value from their agroforestry production. This, however, requires sustained efforts at multiple levels, including promoting better practices on the ground to increase productivity and profitability, developing markets and private sector engagement, and facilitating supportive policies and institutions.

People work together in a paddy in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Photo by A. Erlangga/CIFOR

Protecting the forest

One example of how to turn traditional community practices into a successful business venture comes from the Mount Mutis Nature Reserve in West Timor. Here, communities come together every year to harvest wild forest honey. The task is dangerous – men scale trees of up to 80 meters to collect the honey by hand – but it is also sustainable because it does not require cutting down trees.

The honey supplements local diets, and there is enough left over to sell. In fact, as much as 30 tons of wild honey is produced and harvested in Mt. Mutis annually, accounting for 25 percent of total production in the province. Working collaboratively with WWF Indonesia – which is one of the project’s NGO partners along with others like Threads of Life – Kanoppi has helped brand and package the honey, which is now sold as “Mt. Mutis honey” and sold to neighboring islands.

Similarly on Sumbawa island, this commercial success is good news for communities and for the forest: Because the continued honey production hinges on a healthy ecosystem, people have a strong economic incentive to preserve and protect the forest.

That’s the underlying logic of the whole project. When communities can successfully market and sell sustainable products, their incentive to continue sustainable forestry practices grows, which in turn increases productivity, profitability and incomes.

“We want to reinforce this virtuous cycle where business opportunities foster sustainable forestry,” said Aulia Perdana, a marketing specialist with ICRAF. “That’s why we try to involve the private sector – for example in the village learning centers we’ve established in project sites – so that communities can better connect with the market.”

Other efforts to promote sustainable and profitable agroforestry production include using voluntary extensionists, meaning that the people who first adopt a new technology help spread those innovations to other members of the community. Eleven on-farm demonstration trials have already been established, and 40 more are planned for 2019. Kanoppi has also published manuals, journal articles, videos and a picture book to promote its methodology.

Read the picture book: Secrets of the Mutis Honey Hunters

Landscape perspective

Given the project’s success with marketing the sustainably produced honey from Mt. Mutis, the local district administration has adapted its strategy on integrated landscape-level management of NTFP to give greater weight to communities’ customary practices. This is an important first step toward establishing policy support elsewhere in the country.

Honeycomb drains through a nylon filter in Indonesia. Photo by S. Purnama Sarie/ICRAF

One challenge has been that past planning and policies have separately focused on different sectors, such as small farms in forestry and target-oriented cash crop production led by other sectors – not considering opportunities for synergies or problematic overlaps. Kanoppi has departed from that approach.

“We talk about integrated landscape management, which essentially is about harmonizing the different land uses along the watershed from upstream to downstream, so that farms, plantations, forests and many other kinds of activities coexist and reinforce each other,” said Ani.

“The landscape perspective helps everyone – communities, businesses and authorities – see what kind of production fits where in the landscape, in ways that are both profitable and sustainable.”

Kanoppi is a clear example of how combining the expertise and experience of CIFOR and ICRAF scientists makes for a strong response to development and sustainability challenges in forested landscapes – among the many reasons why the two institutions recently announced a merger.

In Indonesia, Ani, Perdana and their colleagues will continue their work to develop inclusive, sustainable business models that generate a fair return – specifically focusing on scaling-up the adoption of improved production practices and value chains to benefit smallholder livelihoods through landscape-scale management of the farm-forest interface – for communities and for forests.

By Marianne Gadeberg, communications specialist.

This research is part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). FTA is the world’s largest research for development program to enhance the role of forests, trees and agroforestry in sustainable development and food security and to address climate change. CIFOR leads FTA in partnership with Bioversity International, CATIE, CIRAD, INBAR, ICRAF and TBI. FTA’s work is supported by the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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  • Strengthening producer organizations is key to making finance inclusive and effective

Strengthening producer organizations is key to making finance inclusive and effective

08 March, 2019

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Biofuel plantations in the Miombo woodlands, Zambia. Photo by J. Walker/CIFOR
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Duncan Macqueen. ©Macqueen/IIED

As part of the “Innovative finance for sustainable landscapes” interview series, the International Institute for Environment and Development’s (IIED) Forest Team Leader Duncan Macqueen spoke with Tropenbos International’s Nick Pasiecznik on increasing finance and investment in sustainable forestry and farming for smallholders.

“The challenge is to build strong producer organizations and change the perceptions of risk, return and transaction costs,” Macqueen said. This highlights direct support for strengthening membership, management and business as a strategy to develop bankable businesses with investment returns that are attractive to potential financiers. This will, in turn, improve livelihoods and provide an incentive for sustainable forest management.

Among Macqueen’s most recent publications is Access to finance for forest and farm producer organisations (FFPOs).

How do you define ‘inclusive finance’ and why is it important?

Inclusive finance ensures that local forest and farm producers are collectively involved in generating incomes, saving and making investments that improve their livelihoods. Importantly, it is not primarily about individuals, but about producer organizations that include women, landless people and ethnic minorities.

In developing countries, microfinance is rarely at a scale that can lift people out of poverty. Microfinance does, however, help to build individual capacities to understand and manage larger finance. To be transformative for forests and livelihoods, producers must be organized. Producer organizations are essential. They increase the economic scale and technological efficiency of transactions, and the credibility with which investments to upgrade transactions can be managed.

International finance rarely reaches forest and farm producers because financial institutions perceive the risk-to-return ratios and transaction costs to be too high. The challenge is to build strong producer organizations and change the perceptions of all involved.

A training course for women enterprise groups in Belize: “something we should be doing more of”. ©Macqueen/IIED

What are the underlying reasons for the underfinancing of locally controlled agricultural and forest business?

Underfinancing comes down to a lack of a well-directed ‘enabling investment’, i.e. financial support that does not require a financial return. For small businesses to attract ‘asset investment’ which does require a financial return, enabling investments must secure tenure, develop technical production skills, enhance market access and business know-how, and strengthen producer organizations. Building up these four areas makes such businesses ‘bankable’.

There is also a finance gap between micro-finance and large-scale finance. Microfinance is often available. The sums are small, the periods short, the returns fairly predictable (with a high ratio of working-to-fixed capital), and interest rates can be raised to cover high transaction costs. But microfinance rarely stretches to mid-level investments allowing growth. Large-scale finance is also available, but commercial banks rarely address the small needs of producer organizations because of perceptions on returns, risks and costs.

Read more: Background note on FTA financial innovations for sustainable landscapes interviews

What are we not doing right, or not doing well enough, or not doing at all?

Producer organizations must be strengthened. This includes the leadership, management structure and staff skills required to manage savings transparently. Local producers need to organize safe ways of managing savings. Whether to invest in better technology or to repay loans for investment – saving is the key common need. Once saving patterns are established, producer organizations can build up capital, to invest, use as collateral, or to offer financial services for members.

Better forest business incubation is needed to build financial management capacities within organizations that are inclusive of marginal groups. This is already routine in business incubation, but many for-profit services struggle to cover costs in remote forest landscapes. Unless donors can subsidize such costs, their reach is unlikely to extend beyond urban centers. A more innovative solution is to develop business incubation services within umbrella (or ‘apex-level’) producer organizations to aggregate, process and market products and services from their members.

More financial de-risking is required for external investors. There are five immediate priorities: link producer groups with conventional finance through face-to-face meetings or social media technologies; form partnerships to develop loan appraisals for proposals to banks; find ways of developing collateral acceptable to banks (such as standing tree volume); offer guarantees based on social and environmental commitments to offset perceptions of risk; and help banks redesign financial products to meet producers’ capabilities.

Value chain analysis of elephant foot yam with an association of farmers in northeast Myanmar. ©Macqueen/IIED

How is your organization addressing inclusive finance, and what are your experiences and key lessons?

IIED is shaping more inclusive finance within its entire program. Its Natural Resources Group has helped FAO, IUCN and Agricord design a financing mechanism to support producer organizations through the Forest and Farm Facility (FFF). The first phase included 947 producer groups across 10 countries, with 262 businesses helped to add value or diversify products, and 158 examples of new access to finance.

Direct grants to producer organizations require gender equality and inclusion in membership, leadership and representation. Support includes market analysis and development training, learning exchanges, business fairs and trade shows, links to policy platforms, direct brokering of finance with value chain partners and banks, toolkits for risk management and forest business incubation.

FFF is also now reviewing how to improve access to finance and install forest business incubation capacity into apex-level organizations. We have learnt that direct support for strengthening membership, management and business is highly effective. Bankable businesses emerge with investment returns that are attractive to potential financiers, improving livelihoods and providing an incentive for sustainable forest management. This also creates a pipeline for investible businesses for financiers that will attract future investment. A focus on grants, concessional loans or patient equity for locally controlled forest cooperatives results in inclusive cooperatives, but a focus on debt finance for large corporates leads only to local people being treated as cheap labor.

Read also: Making landscape finance more inclusive

What examples do you have of successful or promising ‘model’ approaches or innovations?

Promising innovations come less from inclusive access to finance, but from inclusive distribution of finance. This is a question of business model design, often found in businesses with democratic decision-making where members who live with the consequences of their business decisions, balance economic, social and environmental trade-offs.

An IIED-led analysis of 50 case studies of democratic business models from 24 countries showed six clear innovations. Democratic oversight bodies governing environmental and cultural stewardship improve the natural environment. Negotiated benefit distribution and financial vigilance mechanisms improve material wealth. Networked links to markets and decision-making improve social connectedness. Processes for conflict resolution and justice improve peace and security. Processes of entrepreneurial training and empowerment for both men and women improve human capacity development. Branding that reinforces local visions of prosperity improves a sense of community purpose.

In Nicaragua for example, FFF-mediated finance for the Mayaring women’s cooperative led to the development of 15 new productss using ‘tuno’ (Castilla tunu) bark cloth for vegetables. This led to a 35 percent rise in household incomes and a forest landscape restoration project using the species.

What is your vision on how best to increase finance and investment in sustainable forestry and farming?

My vision is to tailor different financing approaches to different producer organization types. For example, finance could be directed to indigenous peoples’ organizations in natural forests for territorial delimitation and protection; community forest organizations at the forest edge for making sustainable forest management work in collectively controlled natural forests; forest and farm businesses in planted forest ‘mosaics’ for improved social organization alongside asset investments in production; and peri-urban and urban forest product-processing businesses to increase productivity. Financing could be primarily grant finance to indigenous peoples, grants and blended/concessional finance for community forest enterprises, a mix of leasing, trade chain finance and commercial debt finance and guarantees for producer organizations, and more conventional debt finance for peri-urban groups There is no simple rule – everything depends on the circumstances of the group.

Catalyzing multitiered organizations is part of this vision. This includes first-tier local producer organizations selling products and services; second-tier regional organizations aggregating products, adding value through processing, marketing and providing business incubation services to members; and third-tier national federations lobbying governments for more enabling policies. Evidence suggests that strengthening producer organizations is effective in poverty reduction, and improving governance, forest landscape restoration and delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals.

By Nick Pasiecznik, Tropenbos International.

This interview has also been published on the Tropenbos International website.

Duncan Macqueen is a principal researcher in IIED’s Natural Resources Group. IIED is a “policy and action research organization promoting sustainable development and linking local priorities to global challenges”. His research focuses on the success factors for locally controlled forest enterprises, and he has published widely on the subject. We invited Duncan to express his views on inclusive finance, based on his 25 years of experience of working with smallholder groups and communities to strengthen their capacities to run forest-based businesses and access markets and finance. He and his team have worked closely with FAO and the World Bank, among others. His publications include Prioritising Support for Locally Controlled Forest Enterprises and Financing forest-related enterprises: Lessons from the Forest Investment Program: IIED Briefing.

This article was produced by Tropenbos International and the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) as part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). FTA is the world’s largest research for development program to enhance the role of forests, trees and agroforestry in sustainable development and food security and to address climate change. CIFOR leads FTA in partnership with Bioversity International, CATIE, CIRAD, INBAR, ICRAF and TBI. FTA’s work is supported by the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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Strengthening producer organizations is key to making finance inclusive and effective


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Aerial view of a transition forest area in Bokito, Cameroon. Photo by M. Edliadi/CIFOR
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Duncan Macqueen. ©Macqueen/IIED

As part of the “Innovative finance for sustainable landscapes” interview series, the International Institute for Environment and Development’s (IIED) Forest Team Leader Duncan Macqueen spoke with Tropenbos International’s Nick Pasiecznik on increasing finance and investment in sustainable forestry and farming for smallholders.

“The challenge is to build strong producer organizations and change the perceptions of risk, return and transaction costs,” Macqueen said. This highlights direct support for strengthening membership, management and business as a strategy to develop bankable businesses with investment returns that are attractive to potential financiers. This will, in turn, improve livelihoods and provide an incentive for sustainable forest management.

Among Macqueen’s most recent publications is Access to finance for forest and farm producer organisations (FFPOs).

How do you define ‘inclusive finance’ and why is it important?

Inclusive finance ensures that local forest and farm producers are collectively involved in generating incomes, saving and making investments that improve their livelihoods. Importantly, it is not primarily about individuals, but about producer organizations that include women, landless people and ethnic minorities.

In developing countries, microfinance is rarely at a scale that can lift people out of poverty. Microfinance does, however, help to build individual capacities to understand and manage larger finance. To be transformative for forests and livelihoods, producers must be organized. Producer organizations are essential. They increase the economic scale and technological efficiency of transactions, and the credibility with which investments to upgrade transactions can be managed.

International finance rarely reaches forest and farm producers because financial institutions perceive the risk-to-return ratios and transaction costs to be too high. The challenge is to build strong producer organizations and change the perceptions of all involved.

A training course for women enterprise groups in Belize: “something we should be doing more of”. ©Macqueen/IIED

What are the underlying reasons for the underfinancing of locally controlled agricultural and forest business?

Underfinancing comes down to a lack of a well-directed ‘enabling investment’, i.e. financial support that does not require a financial return. For small businesses to attract ‘asset investment’ which does require a financial return, enabling investments must secure tenure, develop technical production skills, enhance market access and business know-how, and strengthen producer organizations. Building up these four areas makes such businesses ‘bankable’.

There is also a finance gap between micro-finance and large-scale finance. Microfinance is often available. The sums are small, the periods short, the returns fairly predictable (with a high ratio of working-to-fixed capital), and interest rates can be raised to cover high transaction costs. But microfinance rarely stretches to mid-level investments allowing growth. Large-scale finance is also available, but commercial banks rarely address the small needs of producer organizations because of perceptions on returns, risks and costs.

Read more: Background note on FTA financial innovations for sustainable landscapes interviews

What are we not doing right, or not doing well enough, or not doing at all?

Producer organizations must be strengthened. This includes the leadership, management structure and staff skills required to manage savings transparently. Local producers need to organize safe ways of managing savings. Whether to invest in better technology or to repay loans for investment – saving is the key common need. Once saving patterns are established, producer organizations can build up capital, to invest, use as collateral, or to offer financial services for members.

Better forest business incubation is needed to build financial management capacities within organizations that are inclusive of marginal groups. This is already routine in business incubation, but many for-profit services struggle to cover costs in remote forest landscapes. Unless donors can subsidize such costs, their reach is unlikely to extend beyond urban centers. A more innovative solution is to develop business incubation services within umbrella (or ‘apex-level’) producer organizations to aggregate, process and market products and services from their members.

More financial de-risking is required for external investors. There are five immediate priorities: link producer groups with conventional finance through face-to-face meetings or social media technologies; form partnerships to develop loan appraisals for proposals to banks; find ways of developing collateral acceptable to banks (such as standing tree volume); offer guarantees based on social and environmental commitments to offset perceptions of risk; and help banks redesign financial products to meet producers’ capabilities.

Value chain analysis of elephant foot yam with an association of farmers in northeast Myanmar. ©Macqueen/IIED

How is your organization addressing inclusive finance, and what are your experiences and key lessons?

IIED is shaping more inclusive finance within its entire program. Its Natural Resources Group has helped FAO, IUCN and Agricord design a financing mechanism to support producer organizations through the Forest and Farm Facility (FFF). The first phase included 947 producer groups across 10 countries, with 262 businesses helped to add value or diversify products, and 158 examples of new access to finance.

Direct grants to producer organizations require gender equality and inclusion in membership, leadership and representation. Support includes market analysis and development training, learning exchanges, business fairs and trade shows, links to policy platforms, direct brokering of finance with value chain partners and banks, toolkits for risk management and forest business incubation.

FFF is also now reviewing how to improve access to finance and install forest business incubation capacity into apex-level organizations. We have learnt that direct support for strengthening membership, management and business is highly effective. Bankable businesses emerge with investment returns that are attractive to potential financiers, improving livelihoods and providing an incentive for sustainable forest management. This also creates a pipeline for investible businesses for financiers that will attract future investment. A focus on grants, concessional loans or patient equity for locally controlled forest cooperatives results in inclusive cooperatives, but a focus on debt finance for large corporates leads only to local people being treated as cheap labor.

Read also: Making landscape finance more inclusive

What examples do you have of successful or promising ‘model’ approaches or innovations?

Promising innovations come less from inclusive access to finance, but from inclusive distribution of finance. This is a question of business model design, often found in businesses with democratic decision-making where members who live with the consequences of their business decisions, balance economic, social and environmental trade-offs.

An IIED-led analysis of 50 case studies of democratic business models from 24 countries showed six clear innovations. Democratic oversight bodies governing environmental and cultural stewardship improve the natural environment. Negotiated benefit distribution and financial vigilance mechanisms improve material wealth. Networked links to markets and decision-making improve social connectedness. Processes for conflict resolution and justice improve peace and security. Processes of entrepreneurial training and empowerment for both men and women improve human capacity development. Branding that reinforces local visions of prosperity improves a sense of community purpose.

In Nicaragua for example, FFF-mediated finance for the Mayaring women’s cooperative led to the development of 15 new productss using ‘tuno’ (Castilla tunu) bark cloth for vegetables. This led to a 35 percent rise in household incomes and a forest landscape restoration project using the species.

What is your vision on how best to increase finance and investment in sustainable forestry and farming?

My vision is to tailor different financing approaches to different producer organization types. For example, finance could be directed to indigenous peoples’ organizations in natural forests for territorial delimitation and protection; community forest organizations at the forest edge for making sustainable forest management work in collectively controlled natural forests; forest and farm businesses in planted forest ‘mosaics’ for improved social organization alongside asset investments in production; and peri-urban and urban forest product-processing businesses to increase productivity. Financing could be primarily grant finance to indigenous peoples, grants and blended/concessional finance for community forest enterprises, a mix of leasing, trade chain finance and commercial debt finance and guarantees for producer organizations, and more conventional debt finance for peri-urban groups There is no simple rule – everything depends on the circumstances of the group.

Catalyzing multitiered organizations is part of this vision. This includes first-tier local producer organizations selling products and services; second-tier regional organizations aggregating products, adding value through processing, marketing and providing business incubation services to members; and third-tier national federations lobbying governments for more enabling policies. Evidence suggests that strengthening producer organizations is effective in poverty reduction, and improving governance, forest landscape restoration and delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Read as PDF: Strengthening producer organizations is key to making finance inclusive and effective

By Nick Pasiecznik, Tropenbos International.

Duncan Macqueen is a principal researcher in IIED’s Natural Resources Group. IIED is a “policy and action research organization promoting sustainable development and linking local priorities to global challenges”. His research focuses on the success factors for locally controlled forest enterprises, and he has published widely on the subject. We invited Duncan to express his views on inclusive finance, based on his 25 years of experience of working with smallholder groups and communities to strengthen their capacities to run forest-based businesses and access markets and finance. He and his team have worked closely with FAO and the World Bank, among others. His publications include Prioritising Support for Locally Controlled Forest Enterprises and Financing forest-related enterprises: Lessons from the Forest Investment Program: IIED Briefing.

This article was produced by Tropenbos International and the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) as part of the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). FTA is the world’s largest research for development program to enhance the role of forests, trees and agroforestry in sustainable development and food security and to address climate change. CIFOR leads FTA in partnership with Bioversity International, CATIE, CIRAD, INBAR, ICRAF and TBI. FTA’s work is supported by the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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  • Gender equality and forest landscape restoration infobriefs

Gender equality and forest landscape restoration infobriefs

12 October, 2018

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Forest Landscape Restoration (FLR) aims to achieve ecological integrity and enhance human well-being in deforested or degraded landscapes. Evidence shows that addressing gender equality and women’s rights is critical for addressing this dual objective. Against this backdrop, CIFOR and a number of partners hosted a Global Landscapes Forum workshop on FLR and gender equality in Nairobi, Kenya in November 2017. The objective of the workshop was to identify and discuss experiences, opportunities and challenges to advancing gender-responsive FLR in East African countries, as well as to join together various stakeholders working at the interface of gender and FLR as a community of practice. This brief set is a tangible outcome of this collaboration, featuring a number of useful lessons and recommendations rooted in the experience and expertise of partners in civil society, multilateral organizations, research community and private sector – all working in different ways to enhance the gender-responsiveness of restoration efforts.

Brief 1: Enhancing effectiveness of forest landscape programs through gender-responsive actions

Brief 2: Role of capital in enhancing participation of women in commercial forestry: A case study of the Sawlog Production Grant Scheme (SPGS) project in Uganda

Brief 3: The impacts of gender-conscious payment models on the status of women engaged in micro-forestry on the Kenyan coast

Brief 4: Mobilizing indigenous and local knowledge for successful restoration

Brief 5: Gender-responsive Restoration Opportunities Assessment Methodology (ROAM): Engendering national forest landscape restoration assessments 

Brief 6: Enhancing Women’s Participation in Forestry Management Using Adaptive Collaborative Management: The Case of Mbazzi Farmers Association, Mpigi District Uganda

Brief 7: What women and men want: Considering gender for successful, sustainable land management programs: Lessons learned from the Nairobi Water Fund

Brief 8: Understanding landscape restoration options in Kenya: Risks and opportunities for advancing gender equality

Brief 9: Building farmer organisations’ capacity to collectively adopt agroforestry and sustainable agriculture land management practices in Lake Victoria Basin

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  • The potential of REDD+ to finance forestry sector in Vietnam

The potential of REDD+ to finance forestry sector in Vietnam

06 August, 2018

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  • Despite the great potential REDD+ shows for generating and contributing finance to support forestry in Vietnam, a reduction in both funds and funder commitment to REDD+, challenges in meeting funder requirements, and the significant finance required to implement the national REDD+ program in Vietnam, all imply that in reality REDD+’s contribution as a major financial source for the forestry sector is limited.
  • Although the government has identified various public and private funding sources to cover the different phases of REDD+, the international public sector remains the primary funding source; limited contributions come from the private sector and state.
  • To date the spending of REDD+ finance has been uncoordinated and fragmented, due to a lack of clarity on what Vietnam’s REDD+ priorities are.
  • Effective and efficient implementation of REDD+ activities in Vietnam is being impeded by: limited and inaccurate data regarding REDD+ finance in Vietnam; an unclear definition of what REDD+ finance is; the absence of a national REDD+ financial tracking system; and limited technical capacity (within both government and civil society organizations) when it comes to monitoring REDD+ finance.
  • To increase the potential for REDD+ to financially contribute to forestry in Vietnam, the following is required: better coordination across sectors and amongst donors and government agencies; enhanced capacity building on the tracking and management of REDD+ finance; development and effective implementation of REDD+ policies and measures, so that the government can access result-based payments from different international funding sources.

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  • Gender in the jungle: a critical assessment of women and gender in current (2014–2016) forestry research

Gender in the jungle: a critical assessment of women and gender in current (2014–2016) forestry research

10 July, 2018

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Fields and forests are gendered spaces. Women’s crucial contributions to productive and reproductive work within and beyond the household have been made visible since the 1970s. There has also been a persistent call for mainstreaming gender in sustainable development and environmental concerns. Prior work discusses the importance of women and gender for forests, and provides guidelines and methods to integrate them in forestry research. This paper assesses the uptake of women and gender issues in recent (2014–2016) forestry research. We found that women and gender concerns are still largely absent or inadequately addressed in forestry research published in scientific journals. Despite the call for greater gender integration in forestry, much needs to be done in quantitative and qualitative terms to meet this goal.

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  • Does the gender composition of forest and fishery management groups affect resource governance and conservation outcomes? A systematic map

Does the gender composition of forest and fishery management groups affect resource governance and conservation outcomes? A systematic map

16 June, 2017

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Background

Women often use natural resources differently than men yet frequently have minimal influence on how local resources are managed. An emerging hypothesis is that empowering more women in local resource decision-making may lead to better resource governance and conservation. Here we focus on the forestry and fisheries sectors to answer the question: What is the evidence that the gender composition of forest and fisheries management groups affects resource governance and conservation outcomes? We present a systematic map detailing the geographic and thematic extent of the evidence base and assessing the quality of the evidence, as per a published a priori protocol.

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  • CIFOR Priorities 2017: Advancing research for forests and people

CIFOR Priorities 2017: Advancing research for forests and people

07 March, 2017

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Aligned with CIFOR’s 2016-2025 Strategy, this document serves as a ‘road map’ to putting the strategy in practice through our impact-oriented research, capacity building, and outreach and engagement activities. Produced on a yearly basis and reviewed at CIFOR’s Annual Meeting, it aims to guide funding partners, implementing partners and staff on CIFOR’s current and future plans to meet the most pressing challenges of forest and landscape management around the world.

In 2017, our work will happen at CIFOR locations across the globe. From Lima to Nairobi, to Indonesia, Vietnam and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, cutting-edge, dynamic research on forests and landscapes will continue to evolve. Major capacity building efforts with students worldwide, heading up a massive partnership involving multiple institutions and targeted data management initiatives are just some of the efforts we look forward to.

Find more details on CIFOR’s plans for 2017 in this document. We look forward to advancing our research on forests, landscapes and people, and to bringing positive impacts to all of the landscapes and communities where we work.

Pages: 56 p.

Publisher: Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Bogor, Indonesia

Publication Year: 2017

Download here

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  • Gender relations in forestry: beyond a headcount

Gender relations in forestry: beyond a headcount


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Photo by Tri Saputro/CIFOR.
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By Kate Evans, originally published on CIFOR’s Forest News

A Kichwa woman takes a rest from cutting down the forest. They are clearing an area to sow corn to feed their livestock near the Napo River in Orellana, Ecuador (Photo by Tomas Munita/CIFOR).
A Kichwa woman takes a rest from cutting down the forest. They are clearing an area to sow corn to feed their livestock near the Napo River in Orellana, Ecuador (Photo by Tomas Munita/CIFOR).

The land boundary dispute with the neighboring village had gone on for years.

But Aditi*, the 60-something female president of her local Forest Rights Committee, used skillful negotiation to convince the neighboring chief that both communities, including members of different indigenous groups, could work together to protect the forest, and continue to collect forest products there – resulting in a positive outcome for all.

This recent story, from the Indian state of Odisha, highlights the role women can play as ‘critical actors’ in defending and managing their forests, says Ph.D. candidate and gender researcher Priyanka Bhalla from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore.

“A lot of times when people talk about success stories they focus on the numbers – one third of the committee were women, etc. – but they forget about women as agents,” she says.

“I wanted to get away from the numbers, to change the language and say, women are positive agents, they are implementing positive processes and they have been doing so for a long period of time at many different scales.”

In a chapter of a new book on Gender and Forests published by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Bhalla examines women’s participation in India’s forest tenure reform process in the state of Odisha, and the ways critical events and processes have influenced their involvement.

In 2006, following a nationwide mobilization demanding local rights over forests, India passed its Forest Rights Act. The new law legitimized the rights of tribal groups (and some other forest dwellers) to access and use ancestral forest lands, providing a framework for communities to govern these territories through village-based Forest Rights Committees (FRCs) and assemblies known as gram sabhas.

The Act came into force in 2008, and required that a third of FRC members be women, and that women make up at least half of assembly attendees.

BEYOND THE NUMBERS

Bhalla volunteered her time with an Odisha-based NGO called Vasundhara, and visited villages in four different districts, investigating how the FRA is being implemented on the ground.

The quota system isn’t enough to ensure women’s participation in decision-making, she discovered.

“Even though the committee is supposed to be comprised of a third women, most of the time there are one or two token female members, and they’re often individuals that don’t know anything about forest rights or indigenous rights.”

Higher caste women and wives of local authority figures tend to be over-represented, she says.

“You can’t assume that just by putting a woman on the committee that she is going to speak for all women – in fact, normally she doesn’t. If she’s a landowner, she’s not going to take into consideration the issues of landless women, for example.”

And in India’s predominantly patriarchal society, “there’s a community culture of women’s exclusion that’s been there for a really long time,” Bhalla says.

“Sometimes women aren’t informed about meeting times, they won’t know about the agenda of the meeting, or they’ll arrive and the meeting is already over, and the men just want their signature in the registration book.”

So in looking beyond the numbers, Bhalla focused her attention on “critical actors” and “critical acts” – that is, individual women like Aditi who had made an impact, and influential events that provide an opportunity for change to benefit women.

Photo by Aulia Erlangga/CIFOR.
Photo by Aulia Erlangga/CIFOR.

One of those acts occurred in 2012, when the FRA was amended to introduce specific guidelines for its implementation: how to properly constitute the Forest Rights Committees, how to do the process of land verification, and how to actually distribute the titles.

This amendment made a huge difference, Bhalla says, with many FRCs re-constituted, thereby increasing participation by women and indigenous groups.

“I went to a couple of different villages where people said again and again, ‘We had a committee from 2008, but we weren’t really sure what it was supposed to do – but then in 2012 it was explained to us how [the FRA] works and why it was done, and since then things have been better,’” Bhalla says.

SIGNS OF PROGRESS

The Vedanta Case was another ‘critical act’ in Odisha, according to Bhalla. Mining company Vedanta Resources wanted to develop an open-cast bauxite mine in the upper reaches of the Niyamgiri hills – an important wildlife habitat and sacred place for the Dongria Kondh indigenous group.

In 2010 the Ministry of Environment and Forests refused to approve the project. The company contested it in India’s Supreme Court – which in 2013 ordered that, under the Forests Rights Act, the decision had to be made by the Niyamgiri villagers themselves.

A series of gram sabhas (village assemblies) in 12 villages in 2013 made it clear that the people did not want the mine to go ahead – and the Supreme Court backed them.

“That was another turning point because it showed that this whole issue of consent can actually be taken seriously,” Bhalla says.

HANGING IN THE BALANCE

However, she’s concerned a new piece of Indian legislation threatens to undermine the recent gains for women and indigenous people.

The Compensatory Afforestation, Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) Bill, introduced in July 2016, could shift power back to the central government, Bhalla says.

“It’s basically in direct conflict with some of the content in the Forest Rights Act, in particular getting consent from local people through the forest committees,” she says.

“So it’s really problematic – let’s say a group has community rights in their village, but under this new bill, the Forests Department can waltz in and undertake planting projects wherever they want.”

“I’m worried about what is going to happen. Nobody knows yet what the scale of its consequences will be.”

* Disclaimer: To protect the identity of individuals, names has been changed.

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Inclusive Forest Industries for a Green Economy

16 August, 2016

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Agroforestry and Forestry in Sulawesi series: Evaluation of the Agroforestry Farmer Field Schools on agroforestry management in South and Southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia

15 February, 2016

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World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) Southeast Asia Regional Program 2016

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  • Yes, we could and we did. Gender specialists share success stories

Yes, we could and we did. Gender specialists share success stories


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Photo: FAO
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By Markus Ihalainen

The event “Gender Matters in Forestry – Challenges and Opportunities”, during the World Forestry Congress in Durban, South Africa, brought together policy makers, practitioners and researchers to look at what is already being done to address gender in forest policy and practice. The panel featured: Esther Mwangi, Principal Scientist (CIFOR), Heidrun Ströbert-Beloud, Gender Officer (GIZ), Patricia Rosete Xotlanihua, Deputy Director of Intersectoral Cooperation, Mexican National Forestry Commission, Eva Müller, Director at the FAO Forest Economics, Policy and Products Division, Bhaswati Thakurta, PhD candidate, University of Calcutta and Åsa Torkelsson, Economic Empowerment Advisor, UN Women.

Photo: FAO
Gender matters in forestry. Photo: FAO

We know gender matters in forestry. An ever-increasing body of research has time and again demonstrated that. We know that cultural norms and power relations often assign men and women different roles in forest use and management; gender inequalities persist in access and control over forest resources, benefit distribution as well as participation in decision-making. These inequalities are further likely to be exacerbated by climate change.

We also know that empowering women in forest management and use is crucial for realizing their rights. It is also often likely to bring about more egalitarian policy outcomes and environmental benefits.

So instead of discussing whether gender matters or not, why not look at what is already being done in terms of addressing gender in forest policy and practice? Our event tried to do just that.

Examining various initiatives and approaches, and understanding what works, what doesn’t, and why, is of crucial importance, also to allow for compiling and up-scaling best practices and identifying the enabling conditions, under which certain approaches to integrating gender translate into the desired outcomes.

Empowering women benefits the forestry sector. Photo: Simon Maina/FAO
Empowering women in forestry also benefits the environment. Photo: Simon Maina/FAO

In Uganda and Nicaragua, CIFOR researchers worked alongside communities to jointly identify and address barriers to equal participation in decision-making. They used a participatory research approach titled Adaptive Collaborative Management (ACM). After five years, women’s representation in forest executive committees is now on par with men’s, compared to the baseline figure of 16% at the inception stage. Involving both women and men in the process also made it easier for men to accept women’s leadership, said presenter Esther Mwangi

Promoting equal participation in forest decision-making also benefits the environment. In her research in India, Bhaswati Thakurta found that laws for equal participation in forest administration groups were often not enforced. Before women were included, it was the responsibility of men to guard the forest area, but they were idle and drank alcohol. This depraved their families of income so that the women saw themselves forced to cut trees illegally to sell them for livelihood.

The West Bengal state forest department changed the scenario radically. They included women in the forest management program and created Forest Protection Committees that were exclusively managed by women. So the illegal felling stopped.

Working with the male-dominated Moroccan Forest Administration on gender mainstreaming, Heidrun Ströbert-Beloud and the GIZ project team asked how the Moroccan forest sector could support gender-equal participation on the local forest user level, if the institution itself is not gender-inclusive? To change this, GIZ trained forest officials on gender issues and helped to bring more women into the forest administration. Since female representation is slowly but constantly increasing and staff are more aware of gender issues, both factors are expected to contribute to a more gender inclusive forest policy.

In Mexico, women’s land ownership and participation in forest decision-making is very limited. To address these issues, CONAFOR has adopted a twofold approach. First, the commission promotes women’s participation through gender-specific programs. These programs focus both on building women’s capacity as well as raising awareness of gender issues among men. Second, the commission – much like GIZ in Morocco – actively works to increase awareness of gender within CONAFOR. This involves studies, stakeholder consultations and building the capacity of staff. For the past two years, CONAFOR has devoted 10% of their budget to gender-specific activities, and their advances in integrating gender considerations into policy were hailed as a “shining example” by Lorena Aguilar from IUCN in the Huffington Post.

Eva Müller stated that women’s participation is increasing in many countries, but their access to decision-making and leadership positions continues to be limited. A study by FAO and RECOFTC suggests that while gender-responsive policies are crucial, they might not be enough to reduce pervasive gender inequalities in forestry. Instead, policies should be supported by a number of additional measures, such as: 1) gender sensitization seminars and workshops for decision-makers; 2) supporting institutions to facilitate incremental learning and knowledge exchange; 3) facilitating coordination between technical line ministries and women’s groups and their alliances; and 4) strengthening the capacity of women’s organizations, user networks to engage in forestry-related consultations.

There is need for further alignment of the sustainability and gender agendas, said Åsa Torkelsson from UN Women. There is no sustainable development without everyone on board. Women are relatively most impacted by climatic changes. UN Women’s forthcoming work with UNEP–UNDP-PEI Africa and World Bank estimates the substantive Cost of the Gender Gap in Agricultural Productivity, and explores the impact on agricultural production and national income. This gap exists because women frequently have unequal access to key agricultural inputs, such as land, labor, knowledge, fertilizer and improved seeds. Sticky areas for gender inequalities remain and new areas emerge: land, access to technologies. UN Women’s Alliance for Women in Technologies proposes to increase women’s productivity and time-saving and reduce post-harvest losses.

All presentations showed that working jointly with forestry departments and local communities to raise awareness and build their capacity in gender issues, encouraging equal representation and offering continued support, are measures that have the potential of resulting in more gender-responsive policies and outcomes.

Throughout the presentations, the importance of involving boys and men in the process of changing gender relations was stressed as a key factor for ensuring both immediate and long-term success. Unequal power-relations are often deeply rooted in norms and institutions, and thus rarely questioned. By identifying and discussing privileges and power that groups have over one another, and pointing at both the injustice of inequality and the collective benefits of equality, perceptions of what is “normal” can slowly begin to change.

 

 

 

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