APF NET CURRICULUM 3
INTERNATIONAL DIALOG UE ON FORESTRY ISSUES
Lecture 8 Mandates and activities of forestry -related international organizations
addressing forestry issues (Part 1) Inter-governmental organizations
Part 1
Transcripts
Duration: 00:12:50
Slide/Screen 1:
Lecture eight in Module III we were talk about the mandates and activities of
forestry-related international organizations addressing forestry issues in two
parts. Part one on the intergovernmental organizations and part two on the non governmental research organization which will be the next lecture, lecture
number nine. Why are we talking about these? Why you want to know? First of
all, it's very important for anyb ody who is studying international forestry or
doing any international work to know which organizations in the world, U.N. and
outside the U.N. are dealing with forests. Some of them are dealing as the main
mandate and others on the side or part of their ma ndate. Also we mentioned in
the negotiation and on the conventions that the international organization play
a very important role supporting the countries in their negotiation. So that is
what is this part of the lecture or part of the module, lecture eigh t and nine
about.
Slide/Screen 2
The first organization, international or inter -governmental let me just talk a
little bit about the difference between intergovernmental and international.
When we talk about an intergovernmental organization which means that all
countries of the world, it could be 2 or 10 or 15 or all the countries of the world
as governments, they get together for an activity, this is an intergovernmental
activity, an activity between the governments or among the governments. If it
is an international organization this means that it could be international, either
governments or nongovernment, everybody there but they are coming from
different nations or different states, that's the difference between the two. The
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food and agriculture organization is a United Nations organization, which means
that it has membership as our countries as members, like members of the U.N.
It's an organization under the U.N. umbrella. Its mission is to eradicate, this is
a new mission to eradicate hunger, eradic ate food insecurity and malnutrition.
Second mission is to eliminate poverty because poverty is very much related to
hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition and other things. And its mission also
to sustainably managing natural forest of the world, no, na tural resources. It
could be forests, agriculture, water, soil whatever.
Slide/Screen 3
Its priority, as an organization, as an intergovernmental organization is to make
agriculture, forestry and fisheries more productive and sustainable, that's very
important. Not only productive but you have to sustain this productivity,
Slide/Screen 4
Its working modalities are two sections, one is to create and disseminate
information related to food, agriculture and natural resources. In this case
nature sources include forest, fishery and others. So the primary working
modality of the organization FAO is to create and disseminate information,
collect and disseminate information to member countries, also free. Then
another modality is to coordinate knowledge and d ialogue among stakeholders,
to facilitate them. It's a neutral seat where it's a neutral organization where all
the countries, rich and poor, South and North whoever, they can come together
in a neutral setting because its a U.N. organization, it doesn't h ave to take
sides, so they just provide the venue and some technical assistance for the
countries to carry it. Venue for knowledge sharing, dialogue among all the
stakeholders, this could be the governments, the academia, civil society, private
sector, cooperatives and so on. So everybody as long as they come for forest,
U.N. or FAO member country or credited organization they can come to the
meeting or sometimes invited to attend and participate.
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First the department is one of the major departments think I feel myself since I
was in this department for eight years. It's an very important component of
forestry, although we talk about FAO is agriculture and food production, and
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forestry and fishery come under agriculture, for some technical reasons. But
anyway forestry, by i tself, it's a very important department within FAO. Its
initiative is to help nations manage the forests in sustainable way, balancing
social, economic and environmental objectives so that the present generations
can reap the benefits of the earth's forest resources while conserving them to
meet the needs of future generations. That's a very nice statement. It's about
sustainability in the forest and the sustainability depends on social, economic
and environmental objectives. They are pillars for sustainability. You cannot do
one without others. Also, part of the mandate of the FAO forestry department is
to respond to the rapidly changing environment, reach outside the traditional
forest sector, engage in partnerships with all the stakeholders and serve as a
global leader in International forest affairs. So again it's more or less the same
mission of FAO but related to the forest sector, most of the time FAO is engaged
in discussions, collecting information, simulating infor mation from and to
member countries and engage all the stakeholders whether the government,
NGOs, private sector, youth in the discussion, and try to be a leader in
International forest affairs.
Slide/Screen 6
Second major player in forestry, although unl ike FAO. FAO is one of the core
mandates as our organization's force, it's a department by itself. FAO forestry is
there and there are a lot of activities in forestry, mostly related to banking
which means l ending, money and so on. But the World Bank, part of its working
mechanism is to support the developing countries regarding: financing, policy
advice, research and analysis, and technical assistance, that is part of them.
Beside, as a bank, its main objective is to lend the money to countries, like any
other bank, but this is part of the working mechanism. In the forestry sector or
in the band objectives, in general by 2030 in 15 years from now, they hope, the
bank hope to end extreme poverty, decrees percent of people living in poverty
or less than $1.25 a day to not more than 3%. Currently there is 1.2 billion
which is I think it's way way more than 3%. When 1.2 million out to six billion
or seven billion that's quite substantial. Also its goal by 2030 the World Bank to
promote shared prosperity. You kno w some equality some shared prosperity
between the rich and the poor, foster income growth of the bottom 40% of the
population of every country.
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Slide/Screen 7
What is the World Bank's approach to forests? As I say it's a department within
the bank. In its latest strategy, the bank adopted a strategy that would be
going beyond considering forests as assets to be cleared, logged, and protected.
That's very important shift prior to 2000, the bank would not lending any money
to any company or any country doing deforestation or logging, even loggin g, no,
it was all about conservation, and then find out it doesn't pay at the end. They
have to look at conservation but also economic activities. But it is, the forest is
more than an asset to be cleared, logged, and protected, it's more than
protection. The bank also focuses on forest and their linkage to other activities
and sectors. What's the linkage between forest and agriculture? Forest and
water? Energy, mining, transportation, these are all sectors related to forest. So
the main thrust of the 2002 World Bank Forest Strategy which is the kind of the
leading document for the bank's activities in forestry, the main thrust is forests'
potential to reduce poverty, that's the idea. It's a bank so poverty is one o f its
main objectives so they look at forestry and other sectors, agriculture, fishery
whatever. It’s potential to reduce poverty.
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A third organization, intergovernmental organization, also very much working in
forestry is the International Tropical Timber Organization or ITTO which is
located in Yokohama, headquarter is Yokohama, Japan. It's an
intergovernmental organization promoting the conservation and sustainable
management, use and trade of tropical forest resources. So it's mainly foc using
on tropical and you look here, it's very important here to notice that sustainable
management, use and trade, because that is international tropical timber
organization so the use and trade very are important for forest, tropical forest
resources. So the organization ITTO focuses on trade and industry and on
sustainable management of forests. This is two sides, most of others are really
working on sustainable management whatever, the definition of sustainable
management is related to the sector but th ey talk about sustainable
management attitude on trade and industry, they pay a lot of attention to these
sectors.
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Slide/Screen 9
The working mechanism in ITTO is quite similar to FAO but with focus on the
tropics and focus on trade and use, so ITTO colle cts, analyses and disseminates
data on the production and trade of tropical timber, that's very important
because it's trade of tropical timber is very important commodity globally, so
they collect information, analyze it to make available to countries, an d mostly to
the private sector. Also attitude on co-fund projects and action aimed at
developing forest-related industries at both community and industrial scales.
There is a lot of projects or activities in ITTO supporting the, either the small
industry or the big industry so that you know it helped develop the industry,
and help inject a lot of sustainability.
Slide/Screen 10
[End of Module III, Lecture 8, Part 1]
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