This regional meeting aims at fostering the development of non-wood forest products-based micro-enterprises. The meeting will validate national studies conducted under the framework of the FAO regional initiative on  SSFF in Lebanon, Tunisia, Sudan and Algeria on the potential of NWFPs for value chain development and value addition and elaborate a concept note for a regional project proposal. The overall goal of the project is to contribute to poverty reduction and livelihoods improvement of the rural poor people in the targeted countries through maximizing their gains from the commercialization of the NWFPs. Policy actions in support of the valurization of NWFPs and development of NWFPs-based rural microenterprises will improve the forest sector's contribution to the rural development, while supporting countries’ efforts to achieving sustainable management of the forest resources. By doing so the project will contribute to countries’ efforts for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 1 & 15). The project will also foster regional collaboration and experience sharing in the development of the NWFPs sector