This infobrief summarizes the findings of a five-year process (2011-16) that explored how to strengthen women’s rights to forests and trees and increase their participation in forest decision making and benefits capture. It presents insights from the implementation of Adaptive Collaborative Management (ACM), an approach tested in different cultural settings. ACM...

FAO Project: "Forest restoration in Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia using treated wastewater to sustain smallholders' and farmers' livelihoods" GCP/RAB/013/ITA. This case study presents two hypotheses for the implementation of a fertigation plant for olive trees in Tunisia.

This study on “forest administration and related institutional arrangements” is a component of a wider initiative jointly undertaken by the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry (KSLA), the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) and the African Forest Research Network (AFORNET) at the Academy of Sciences...

To increase forest farmers’ income and promote the rapid development of collective forest areas, China has implemented reforms of its collective forest tenure system since 2003. The main thrusts of these reforms have been clarifying property rights, reducing taxes, liberalizing business operations, and regulating the transfer of rights over forest...

In 2011, the European Forest Institute Central-East European Regional Office (EFICEEC) conducted a study for FAO to improve knowledge on the origins, evolution and current situation of forest owners’ associations and cooperatives in selected Eastern European countries, assess their effectiveness, and analyse lessons learned from experience of legislation, policies, strategies,...

This case from Indonesia describes the successful formation of a 744 member cooperative, the Koperasi Hutan Jaya Lestari (KHJL), which has maintained FSC group certification since 2005 and supplies teak for use in the international furniture market. The cooperative was also awarded the right to manage 4,640 ha of state...

NWFPs are an important component of food and livelihood security in ACP countries. The development and sustainability of these resources depends upon judicious management which stay within the limits of production. Many NWFPs are wild species where production levels are determined by ecological processes rather than cultivation. An expert workshop held...

Small and medium forest enterprises (SMFEs) are the norm in many developing country contexts. They often make up 80–90% of enterprise numbers and more than 50% of forest-related jobs. While there is little evidence that large-scale commercial forestry plays a substantial role in reducing poverty, SMFEs offer better prospects –...

Cambodia has one of the worst rates of deforestation in the world. There are many pressures on its wood resources: much of the Cambodian economy depends on wood, for timber, heat and power generation, and about 80% of households use wood or charcoal for cooking. The French NGO GERES had helped to reduce wood...

This handbook is based on TFT’s seven years of experience working with smallholders to set up group certification systems in remote and diverse settings. It is designed to provide simple and practical solutions to the most common challenges smallholders face when trying to achieve group certifi cation. The information presented here is general in...