A class room lecture and field visit to a planted forest established by a community forestry user group

Within the framework of FFF’s capacity building and learning program (“pillar 3”), the FFF team in cooperation with the Myanmar Environment Rehabilitation-Conservation Network (MERN) and the Myanmar Forestry Department had organized the second one-week training course on “Sustainable Timber Production and Value Chain Creation” for 31 persons from Community Forestry User Groups. The participants were from Kachin State (8), Sagaing Division (8), Mandalay Division (6), Shan State (3) Rakhine State and Pego Division (2 each), Chin State and Yangon (1 each). The training was held from 6 to 9 March at the Central Forestry Development Training Center (CFDTC) in Patheingyi, ca. 5 km east of Mandalay. The first training of this kind was held in May 2015 at the Central Forestry Development Training Center (CFDTC) in Hmawbi.

The training event was opened by Mr.Tint Swe, the Director of the Training and Research Development Division, Forestry Department, Ms. Fan Xaojie, FAO Representative in Myanmar, Mr. Aung Thant Zin, CEO of MERN and Mr. Jhony Zapata from the FFF-Facility at FAO-HQ, Rome (Photo 1). The training focused on learning opportunities to improving the livelihoods of rural communities by engaging in business-oriented nursery and planted forest management, agroforestry production systems, processing and marketing of wood and non-wood forest products for commercial and subsistence purposes. Building technical and commercial capacities in these subjects will finally contribute to create employment for community members, contribute to a higher family income, improved food sufficiency, and reduced deforestation in poor rural areas of Myanmar.

The training program comprised a number of classroom lectures, practical classroom exercises, group work and a one-day field trip to a 834 acre large planted forest established by a community forestry user group, a sawmill and moulding factory for the processing of teak hardwood, and a privately owned agroforestry farm comprising forest plantations for the production of wood and non-wood forest products, fruit trees and animal husbandry (Photos 2 and 3). The instructors were recruited from the Central Forestry Development Training Center in Patheingyi (CFDTC), the Myanmar Timber Enterprise (MTE), the private forestry sector and Dr. Walter Kollert from FAO-HQ in Rome.

The training program was very well organized and efficiently implemented. The participants showed high interest in the training program and actively contributed to the subject-related discussions, group work and field visits. They confirmed that they would apply the acquired knowledge for their professional work in their home institutions. The evaluation of the training course by the participants at the end of the training session resulted in overwhelmingly positive results. The Forest and Farm Facility will replicate such training course at another time for participants from other institutions and regions.