FAO Forestry Paper 161

Developing effective forest policy - A guide


Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome 2010




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ISBN 978-92-5-106607-2

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© FAO 2010


Contents

(Download complete version - 1,9 MB)


Foreword
Acknowledgements
Summary: Ten things to know about forest policy
(Download - 272 KB)

1. Introduction (Download - 263 KB)

Background
Purpose of the guide

2. What is a national forest policy? (Download - 333 KB)

What is a national forest policy and why should a country have one?
What do national forest policies look like?
How does a forest policy relate to forest laws, national forest programmes, strategies and action plans?
How does a national forest policy link to other policies?

3. Policy development in a dynamic environment (Download - 102 KB)

What has changed in policy development?
Clarifying when a change is needed – and possible

4. Getting started: first steps in policy development  (Download - 101 KB)

Planning, capacity building and communication
Preparatory analysis: providing key background information
High-level political leadership and administration support
Determining who should be involved and how, and the type of support needed
Guiding and managing the process: steering body and management team

5. Developing an agreement through dialogue and negotiation (Download - 297 KB)

Stakeholder discussions and consultation at the local, regional and national levels
Developing an agreement on goals, objectives and their implementation
Drafting a forest policy statement
Stakeholder validation of the draft forest policy

6. Preparing adoption and implementation of the forest policy (Download - 300 KB)

Preparing for formal adoption
Preparing for implementation
Maintaining a dialogue during implementation

7. Conclusions and outlook (Download - 51 KB)

References (Download - 50 KB)

Annex 1: Examples of Tables of Contents of forest policy statements (Download - 51 KB)
Annex 2: Examples of vision or goal statements and principles (Download - 59 KB)
Annex 3: Further reading (Download - 189 KB)