White Papers

Évaluation des Directives OIBT pour la restauration, l’aménagement et la réhabilitation des forêts tropicales (Evaluation of ITTO Guidelines for the restoration, management and rehabilitation of tropical forests)

This report provides case studies on the restoration of degraded and secondary forests in Ghana, Indonesia, and Mexico. The authors summarized common needs as they relate to each case, such as the needs for efficient governance, financial viability, monitoring and evaluation programs, and integrative management. Finally, they provided recommendations to the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO, or OIBT in French) for priorities and future areas of interest.

 

Open access copy available

Towards Productive Landscapes

Background

Increasingly, practitioners, scientists, and policymakers are recognizing the need to puruse integrated landscape level initiatives to address restoration issues. Given this, this report draws on 29 papers by practitioners all over the world that highlight both the successes and challenges of landscape approaches in order to inform the future of these practices.

Open access copy available

Payments for Environmental Services: Some Nuts and Bolts

Background

This paper reviews current literature and considers observations from Latin America and Asia to describe Payment for Environmental Services (PES) strategies. 

Research Goals & Methods

This paper aims to help demystify PES for non-economists, starting with a simple and coherent definition of the term.

Open access copy available

Gestion durable des ressources forestières: Rapport pour les états généraux de la forêt, de la faune et des ressources en eau (Sustainable management of forest resources: report on the state of forest, fauna, and water resources)

The authors discuss causes for ecosystem degradation in Ivory Coast. They highlight problems of governance, inappropriate management techniques, industrial exploitation of minerals and production of charcoal, ultimately offering recommendations to improve forest management.

 

Open access copy available

Etude environnementale de la Réserve naturelle forestière de Bururi (Environmental study of the Bururi forest reserve)

The author presents a study of the Buruni forest reserve in Burundi (RNFB). He puts the current state of the forest in a historical context and provides a survey of animals and plants living in the reserve. The author details the forest reserve's ecological functioning and provides hydrologic and climatic data about the reseve along with discusses the threats to the Buruni forest reserve and offers suggestions for its protection.

 

Open access copy available

Pratiques de restauration des zones degradees d’Afrique de l’Est (Restoration practices in degraded landscapes of Eastern Africa)

The author provides an introduction to the state of the land, i.e. extent of degradation in eastern Africa. He then goes on to discuss restoration practices and for degraded landscapes in eastern Africa. The author also provides an evaluation of reforestation practices currently in use. The author ends by reviewing successful technologies for reforestation in eastern Africa and offering suggestions for scaling up.

 

Open access copy available

Participatory Monitoring in Tropical Forest Management: A Review of Tools, Concepts and Lessons Learned

background

This report reviews the impacts, challenges, and shortcomings of well-documented cases of successful as well as unsuccessful participatory monitoring programs in tropical forests across the globe.

Open access copy available

The Mountain Pine Ridge Reforestation Project

Background

By 2000, the pine trees in the Mountain Pine Ridge Forest Preserve in Belize were heavily attacked by the Southern Pine Bark Beetle (Dendroctomus frontalis). The beetle did so much damage that the natural restoration of the pine forest was practically unattainable due to a lack of seed resources and continuing fires. The alternative is to abandon management and allow a pine savannah to develop. This paper compares the carbon sequestion potentional for a pine forest and a pine savannah in this region. 

Open access copy available

Assuming Women’s Representation in Carbon Forestry Projects

Background

Women have historically played a critical role around the world in forest-related decision making yet there has been a significant unequal representation of this stakeholder group when it comes to the recent explosion of carbon-trading interventions, such as payment for ecosystem services (PES) schemes, clean development mechanisms (CDM), and reduced emmissions and deforestation and forst degradation (REDD+). This unequal representation has been widely recognized and there is a fear that it is getting worse as forest governance changes. 

Open access copy available

Multiple-Use Forest Management in the Humid Tropics: Opportunities and Challenges for Sustainable Forest Management

background

This report documents three regional assessments that were carried out between 2009 and 2012 to identify and draw lessons from on-the-ground initiatives in multiple-use forest management (MFM) in the Amazon Basin, the Congo Basin and Southeast Asia. 

Open access copy available
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