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This tool is intended to help countries evaluate their forest tenure systems, particularly those that facilitate participation of non-state actors in forestry, including co-management regimes, community forestry, smallholder forestry, large holder forestry, or company concessions granted on State lands. It uses the internationally endorsed Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests (VGGT) as its basis. Forest tenure review may be conducted in the context of policy or legal reform, to inform Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) policy formulation, to improve understanding of a specific tenure system that is under-performing, or to [...]

As the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity 2011–2020 comes to a close and countries prepare to adopt a post-2020 global biodiversity framework, this edition of The State of the World’s Forests (SOFO) examines the contributions of forests, and of the people who use and manage them, to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity.Forests cover just over 30 percent of the global land area, yet they provide habitat for the vast majority of the terrestrial plant and animal species known to science. Unfortunately, forests and the biodiversity they contain continue to be under threat from actions to convert the land [...]

This brief highlights some of the identified and perceived impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on development aspects interconnected with the forest sector, with a particular emphasis on the impacts on the production and trade of forest products. It proposes a series of recommendations as a basis for policy development in the aftermath of the crisis, and highlights potential opportunities to leverage the progress achieved so far, to ensure that decades of advances are not reversed. Although the forest sector is traditionally seen as more resilient (harvesting cycles are longer than other commodities), the multi-faceted contribution of the sector to broader development [...]

The sustainable utilization of natural resources is a major element of rural livelihoods and economic development in Brazil. From 2011 to 2019, FAO implemented the project “Strengthening the national knowledge and information framework to foster sustainable forest resources management policies". This project helped to establish and consolidate a National Forest Inventory (NFI) model approved by, and agreed with, different partners and stakeholders in the forest sector. The focus given to institutional strengthening and data collection was strategic to achieve an unprecedented level of qualified knowledge on the topic. To date, there is some evidence on the use of NFI results [...]

Forest products conversion factors provides ratios of raw material input to the output of wood-based forest products for 37 countries of the world. Analysts, policymakers, forest practitioners and forest-based manufacturers often have a need for this information for understanding the drivers of efficiency, feasibility and economics of the sector. In addition, conversion factors are often needed to convert from one unit of measure to another. The publication also includes explanations on the units of measure, the drivers of the ratios, as well as information on physical properties of wood-based forest products. Finally, where reported factors were unavailable, factors from other [...]

Uganda is currently hosting over 1.3 million refugees making it the largest refugee host country in Africa. The inflow of refugees is reported to have exacerbated a range of ongoing environmental impacts and associated challenges, including land degradation and woodland loss, resulting in inadequate access to energy for cooking and competition with local people for water and other natural resources. Supporting more sustainable use of those resources, especially forests and other woodlands, could help address environmental degradation and improve energy access. Building on a 2018 assessment of natural resource degradation in the refugee-hosting areas of northern Uganda, FAO, in collaboration with [...]

The Sustainable Wildlife Management (SWM) Programme is the first international initiative to tackle the wild meat challenge by addressing both wildlife conservation and food security. This African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP) initiative is funded by the European Union through the 11th European Development Fund (EUR 45 Million). The SWM Programme mobilizes an international group of partner organizations with strong expertise and experience in wildlife conservation, food security and policy development. It is implemented through a consortium partnership, which includes the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Wildlife [...]

This document provides technical guidance for countries to integrate Sustainable Land Management (SLM) into national policies and programs. It was developed in the context of the project "Desicion Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling up Sustainable Land Management (DS-SLM)" supporting country teams in designing operational strategies for mainstreaming information on land degradation and SLM into national and subnational decision-making processes.

Nearly three years ago, world leaders agreed to the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – the central framework for guiding development policies throughout the world. This edition of The State of the World’s Forests is aimed at enhancing our understanding of how forests and their sustainable management contribute to achieving several of the SDGs. Time is running out for the world’s forests: we need to work across sectors, bring stakeholders together, and take urgent action. The State of the World’s Forests 2018 identifies actions that can be taken to increase the contributions [...]