Annex 3 Records of group and plenary discussions in the workshop

Working section I Key issues and trends

Group I (Turkey, UAE, Lebanon, Qatar, and Syria)

1. degradation of biodiversity

2. pressure on the land use

3. lack of legislations

4. forest fires

5. lack of available land for plantation

6. lack of political commitments

7. land tenure problems

8. further development of ecotourism

9. demand for non-wood forest products

10. increasing effects of NGOs

Group II (Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, Cyprus and Yemen)

1. Sustainable forest and rangeland management

1) overgrazing

2) drought

3) water scarcity

4) desertification

5) over logging

6) forest fires

7) encroachment

8) high cost of reforestation

9) sustainable forest management

10) need of urban forestation

11) watershed management

12) sand dune fixation

13) increase in forest cover

14) multiple use of forest

15) reservation of forest ecosystem

2. Environmental goods and services

1) Overgrazing

2) Tourism

3) Biodiversity

4) Sand dune

5) Watershed

6) Multiple use

7) Ecosystem

3. Social and economic functions

1) Lack of financial support and investment

2) Poverty and unemployment

3) Lack of awareness

4) Lack of participation of civil society and NGOs

5) The need to maximize the benefits

6) Multiple use of forest resources

7) Ecotourism

8) Grazing and wood collection

4. Policy and institutions

1) Awareness

2) Encroachment

3) Ownership and land tenure

4) Restructure of curriculum – education

5) Reformulate forest policies and institutions

6) Lack of specialized foresters and institutions – capacity building

Working section II Driving forces

Group I (Turkey, UAE, Lebanon, Qatar, and Syria)

Driving forces		Actors	Predicable (P) or uncertain (U)
Demographic and social	Population increase	Ministries in charge of population affairs	P
	Distribution of population (by age groups or geographic	Ministries in charge of population affairs	P
	Poverty	State planning organizations	U
	Urbanization	Ministries of internal affairs & municipalities	P
Economic	Liberalization and privatization	WTO	P
	GDP – economic growth	Ministry in charge of economic development	U
Environmental	Industrial waste and disposals	Municipalities, governors	U
	Desertification and natural disasters	Ministry of agriculture (for desertification)	U
Technological	IT technologies (GIS, communication, etc.)	International corporations	P
	Wood processing technology	International corporations	P
	Biotechnology	International corporations	P
Institutional and political	Forest related conventions	International community and the state	P
	Decentralization	Governments	P
	National policies	Governments	U
	Civil movement	International organizations and private sector	P

Group II (Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, Cyprus and Yemen)

Driving forces		Actors	Predicable or uncertain	Importance
Demographic and Social	Population growth	G+P	P	1
	Age structure	G	P	6
	Migration: external and internal Driven by economic and political forces	G	P	4
	Emigration	G	P	5
	Urbanization	G	P	2
	Per capita income	G	U	3
Economic changes	Economic liberalization	G, state policy, international communities	P	1
	Economic growth	G+I.C	P	5
	Investment	G+P.S	P	3
	Economic reform	G	P	4
	Foreign debt	G+I.C	P	2
Technological changes	Biotechnology	G+P.S	P	3
	Nano-technology	G	P	4
	Information technology	G+P.S	P	1
	Communication technology	G+P.S	P	2
Environmental changes	Water shortage	Regional concerns	P	1
	International conventions	I.C	P	2
	Public awareness	civil societies	P	3
Political and institutional changes	Participation extension	G+NGOs+L.C+C.S	P	5
	Political will	G	U	3
	Institutional changes	G	P	4
	Political changes	G	U	2
	Security and instability	G	P	1

Note: G = government

P = people

I.C = international communities

P.S = private sector

Working section III future alternative scenarios

Plenary discussion on regional scenario formulation:

1. Country grouping

a. Grouping by socio-economic set ups

(Based on the UNDP human development report)

b. Grouping by different types of ecosystem

i. Mediterranean

Cyprus, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan

ii. Iranian

Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq

iii. Saharan

KSA, Qatar, UAE, Oman, Yemen, Bahrain, and Kuwait

2. Country’s position in the suggested regional scenarios