Forests Sourcebook - HCV Resource Network

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Management of forests (state and nonstate forests)
– Forest management operations (silviculture, regeneration,
harvesting, planning, and control)
– Sales of timber and nonwood forest products
Processing and marketing of timber and nonwood products
Public forest administration
– Formulation of policy and legislation
– Control and enforcement
– Development of forest information systems
– Education and research
– Extension
OPERATIONAL ASPECTS
Reform processes vary. Specific steps in a reform process
will vary, depending on initial conditions. To initiate
reform, all actors need to cooperatively create a basic understanding
of targets and strategy for forest sector management.
This policy should focus on equity, sustainability, biodiversity,
and economics, and should include strategic
guidance for the main actors to determine their objectives
and operational methods for using the resource in a sustainable
and cooperative way. The main actors are
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national and local governments;
commercial private sector;
communities (including Indigenous Peoples) and smallholders,
including cottage industries;
civil society; and
technical and financial assistance institutions, including
research facilities.
Post conflict contexts require attention to capacity
issues. In postconflict countries, the capacity of different
groups to engage in dialogue may need to be strengthened.
This dialogue may need to be facilitated to ensure that
all stakeholders start on a level playing field; thus, the
process may need to be adapted accordingly (see box 5.8).
The major implementation challenges in reforming forest
institutions include organizing a temporary minimal
authority structure to deal with short-term necessities,
Box 5.8
The Liberia Forest Initiative: Institutional Reform in a Postconflict Country
In April 2004, the U.S. government sent a team to
Liberia to initiate discussions with the provisional government
and civil society representatives, and came to
the conclusion that Liberia’s forest sector was “utterly
dysfunctional” (McAlpine, O’Donohue, and Pierson
2006) and that the Forest Development Authority
(FDA) required a complete overhaul and adequate
capacity and resources. The unique feature of the multidonor
effort that followed was that although donor
roles were coordinated to avoid duplication and ensure
a strategic approach, each donor maintained a high
degree of sovereignty over the allocation of its funds.
The Liberia Forest Initiative (LFI) was designed to
promote and assist reforms in Liberia’s forestry sector
to create management transparency and ensure that
forest resources are managed in an economically, environmentally,
and socially sustainable way, to the maximum
benefit of all Liberians, in accordance with
Liberia’s national policies and laws, and consistent with
its international legal commitments. Although it was
initiated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2004
in response to concerns that proceeds from unsustainable
logging were fueling the ongoing civil war, the LFI
quickly came to involve a wide range of governmental
and nongovernmental organizations, a and has come to
encapsulate a broad mandate. From the outset, the LFI
recognized that thorough and effective reforms would
require cross-cutting attention to the “3 C’s” of forestry
in Liberia: the commercial sector, conservation, and
community forestry. As a priority focus, however, the
LFI identified a few major components as critical to
bringing the commercial sector back on line and
addressing essential concerns of the UN Security
Council:
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Financial management and accountability. There was
a critical need to restore transparent financial management
policies and practices as well as accountability
in the forest sector (in particular, to timber
products) and to implement transparent and equitable
allocation of resources generated by the forest
sector.
Institution building. An FDA with the staff, skills,
and means (financial and physical) to carry out its
mandate needed to be established.
Forest allocation policy and practice. There was a need
to plan and initiate formal forest use in a balanced,
(Box continues on the following page)
NOTE 5.2: REFORMING FOREST INSTITUTIONS 167