Rob de Fegely
The second day of the 19th Commonwealth Forestry Conference began with the Global Forestry Conclave for discussion on the role of forestry in implementing international agreements in Commonwealth member nations and beyond with the focus on moving from agreed texts to action on ground. Source: The Pioneer
The conclave came up with recommendations to relook to the joint forestry management conservation strategies, to strengthen the partnership between research and development institutions, industry and voluntary organisations with the increased use of social media to generate awareness and to educate the negotiators so that they could understand the problem of implementation.
Delivering a keynote address at the plenary session, the director and national president of Institute of Forests of Australia, Rob de Fegely, talked about future forestry in Australia and explained how a more informed decision can be taken on management in the country where large planted forests are largely privatised.
He also pointed out the reason behind no further expansion of planted forest estates and suggested certain measures to resolve the competing demand for renewable resources like wood and improve the conservation outcomes of forests.
The technical sessions held on the day comprised a total of 25 presentations on the subthemes of impact of climate change, biodiversity, forests and people, sustainable forest management’, adaption to climate change and technologies and strategies for conservation.
Rinku Moni Devi from India talked about application of regional climate models in assessing climate change impacts on forest of Kanha Tiger Reserve; K Jayasurya from India talked on deforestation-led climate change and its effects on women of indigenous forest dependent communities; Milke G Cruickshank from Canada spoke on the interactive effect root diseases and climate on wood properties in half-sibling Douglas-fir families; Miin Bang from South Korea on partnership between ASEAN and Korea towards a sustainable green growth; AK Bhardwaj from India spoke on biodiversity conservation, community livelihood and decentralised management of Pas in Southern Western Ghats, India apart from other speakers who expressed their views on related subjects.
A special session was also held on the occasion on the subject of building for landscape approach-policy and practice opportunity in the Himalayas organised by ICIMOD, Nepal.
The session was aimed at sharing information, experiences and finding of landscape approach implementation, to facilitate a common understanding of the definition and significance of landscape approach and to agree upon boarder principles and practices of landscape approaches.
