Photo: Promode Kant

A IUFRO-SPDC training program on “Science-Society Interactions in Support of Forest Landscape Restoration Implementation” was held at the University of Freiburg as a pre-Congress event from Sept 16 to 18, 2017. Global initiatives like the Bonn Challenge and the New York Declaration on Forests have set a huge target of 350 million hectare of forest and landscape restoration by 2030 before the global community and there has been some progress in the financing of this task, too. But still a lot of effort is needed to prepare the governments and societies at different levels across the world for them to be able to move towards the target efficiently with lower social and economic costs and with minimum distress to the poorer communities. This workshop discussed ways and means of transforming scientific knowledge into useful information for policy and management decisions on the ground. More specifically, the workshop aimed at the following specific objectives:

  • Transforming research results into usable information for problem-solving and policy-making;
  • Encouraging interactions among the scientists and decision makers for defining the social, environmental and economic objectives of forest and landscape restoration; and
  • Analysis of case studies from around the world that demonstrate how past and ongoing landscape restoration activities can contribute to enhancing benefits to society through climate change mitigation and adaptation.

The workshop was open to preselected early and mid-career scientists, working in forest and tree-related research from developing countries in African, Asia, or Latin America and the Caribbean region. A total of 20 trainee from these countries were enabled to take part in the program through financial support arranged by the IUFRO. Dr Michael Kleine, Deputy Chief Executive of IUFRO, Dr John Stanturf of the US Forest Service, and Dr Promode Kant of the Institute of Green Economy, India, acted as resource persons bringing in decades of experience of working in different parts of the globe.

Workshop details: https://www.iufro.org/science/special/spdc/actproj/annivtws/#c26326

This training programme was sponsored by IUFRO’s Special Program for Development of Capacities, https://www.iufro.org/science/special/spdc/.