The Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism (FLRM) online Community of Practice (CoP) on Local Finance for Forest and Landscape Restoration (FLR) invites you to partake in the live webinar introducing the “Role of the private sector in the landscape” on 28 February 2023, 13:00-14:00 CET. Please register here to attend the session.
This webinar will kick off the third learning challenge of the CoP on Local Finance for FLR, entitled “Private sector engagement and development of bankable business plans”, as the first session of the series. The entire learning challenge will be hosted live in English with French translation from 28 February to 16 March 2023.
Join us at the Open Innovation Challenge Webinar on 2 February 2023 at 10:00 CET. The webinar intends to engage with anyone interested in applying for the Open Innovation Challenge by providing valuable insights on how to apply, the documents needed, grants, and benefits.
During the webinar, we will discuss how to apply for the competition and what the benefits are for the solution providers. Check out the agenda:
10:00–10:15 | Introduction: Bioregions Facility and Open Innovation Challenge
If you have any questions, please email bioregions@efi.int, and we might answer your question at the webinar.
The Open Innovation Challenge (OIC) calls for innovative bioeconomy solutions. Start-ups, companies, organizations and universities are welcome to apply and present their innovative solutions – at any stage of development.
The Yale Forest Forum is excited to announce the next speaker series for spring 2023, taking place on Tuesdays, January 17 –April 25th from 12:00 – 1:00 pm US ET. Hosted by The Forest School at the Yale School of the Environment(link is external) in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.
Smallholder Planted Forests and Trees for Climate, Restored Landscapes, and Livelihoods
Planted forests, defined as forests that at maturity are predominantly composed of trees established through planting and/or deliberate seeding[i] represent 7 percent of global forest area[ii]. While the world’s natural forests are shrinking, with 420 million ha of forest lost through deforestation over the last 30 years[iii], the surface of planted forests is continuously expanding. Planted forests and trees outside of forests e.g., woodlots, fruit trees, hedgerows, etc. harbor an untapped potential to fulfill future needs through area expansion and productivity increases in existing planted forests[iv].
A significant portion of planted forests and trees outside forests are owned and/or managed by smallholders. Smallholder forestry usually takes place on land privately owned by non-industrial stakeholders. While smallholder forestry has a long history in Western Europe and North America, it has rapidly expanded in recent years to other parts of the globe[v]. Between 1990 and 2005, the area under smallholder ownership has increased three-fold[vi] and by 2005, smallholders owned 26% of planted forests globally[vii], largely exceeding planted forest area under corporate ownership. Furthermore, planted forests managed for productive functions made up 32% of all global planted forest area[viii].
Despite these increases, smallholders face technical, commercial, policy, and institutional challenges that hamper their performance, negatively impact their returns on investment, and ultimately affect their long-term viability. As reported by FAO[ix], smallholders have driven the dramatic expansion of tree plantations worldwide in the recent past and this trend may reverse if smallholders are forced to change from forestry to another land use.
This webinar series will focus on ways to harness the potential of smallholder planted forests and trees to contribute to the provision of environmental services, including addressing climate change, and livelihoods. It will primarily focus on the following questions:
What are the key success factors in the establishment and management of planted forests and trees outside forests by smallholders?
Which management objectives do smallholders pursue and how are they implemented according to business best-practices?
What are the operational risks, financial risks, and vulnerabilities smallholders face related to quickly evolving markets and a changing climate?
Which models and practices are most promising?
Which opportunities and business models arise from the transition towards carbon-neutral economies and the global momentum for ecosystem restoration?
What can be done to support smallholders? (i.e., policy, producers’ organizations, etc.
Join us every Tuesday from January 17 – April 25 from 12:00 – 1:00 pm U.S. ET.
Note there will be no webinar on March 14 and March 21.
The Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) Dialogue Series provides an opportunity to explore the most pertinent ESF-related issues and challenges, while strengthening collaboration and partnerships with diverse stakeholders from across the world. The series provides an opportunity for technical experts to share information and obtain feedback from stakeholders on the opportunities and challenges in their work. It also enables peers to share insights on solutions that could be adapted across countries.
Making Accessibility Operational
This is an overview of the World Bank’s work on disability inclusion with concrete examples of how it has made a difference in the lives of persons with disabilities, and the importance of inculcating disability inclusion in conversations with clients with the aim of not only building awareness to disability inclusive development and ensuring that no one is left behind. The engagement highlighted various mechanisms and tools available to operationalize disability inclusion and accessibility in World Bank projects.
Grievance Redess Service in World Bank-financed Operations
This is the second session of the ESF Dialogue Series, with a focus on the World Bank’s Grievance Redress Service (GRS). The 60-minute virtual event provided civil society organizations (CSOs) with an opportunity to learn more about the GRS and its role and scope in the Bank’s overall accountability framework. Through this dialogue, CSOs could also share their views on the current functioning of the GRS and discuss how they can participate in raising awareness of the GRS among project-affected communities.
The SUPERB & IUFRO Forest Restoration Talks investigate forest restoration questions from diverse scientific perspectives, with alternating focus on the global and European levels. The series brings together researchers, practitioners, NGOs, policy makers and other interested stakeholders to explore practical forest restoration approaches experiences and challenges worldwide.
You can find the complete schedule of the upcoming events below. To watch our previous webinars, click here.
Join the Rewilding Community of Practice’s seminar on the role of fascinating fungi in rewilding our planet.
We will host this virtual community gathering on the topic ‘Fascinating Fungi: Invisible Allies in Rewilding’ on Tuesday, the 22nd of November at 5:00PM CET/4:00PM GMT/8AM PST. The duration of the event will be of 90 minutes.
The Rewilding Community of Practice aims to build a network of rewilding enthusiasts and professionals who can exchange ideas and information to help build a better world.
This is a fantastic opportunity for rewilders to learn more about the incredible role fungi play in rewilding – and how to rewild mycological networks – from three experienced practitioners who work on turning these invisible allies into a visible force for good.
We hope you will join us in our effort to scale our collective impact and rewild our planet!
The Speakers
David Satori (Rewilding Mycology), Michael J. Hathaway (World Matsutake Research Group – Simon Fraser University), Bethan Manley (SPUN).
David Satori, Founder of Rewilding Mycology
David Satori is a mycologist, consultant, and founder of Rewilding Mycology. He holds an MSc in Plant and Fungal Taxonomy, Diversity, and Conservation and is a former Species Conservation Researcher at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew where he contributed to IUCN Red List assessments of tropical plant species.
David has extensive experience in designing fungal surveys, generating baseline data, and recognizing opportunities for fungal conservation on sites with various land use histories. He draws from his experience at Kew Gardens, where he managed large databases on plant documentation, distribution, population trends, and threats. He will introduce the field of rewilding mycology, highlight the importance of science being fungi-inclusive and discuss recent strides in the field.
Michael Hathaway, Professor at World Matsutake Research Group – Simon Fraser University
Michael Hathaway is a cultural anthropologist who has been working in China for over a quarter century on two major topics. His first project explored how global conservation programs were re-configured by Chinese scientists, villagers, and wild animals (such as Asian elephants), and his second examines the role of fungi in reshaping economies and ecologies on a vast scale.
He will speak about a mindset shift the world urgently needs: a shift from viewing other organisms as objects of utility (as things to be eaten, commodified or even used in rewilding projects) to fellow beings that are also world makers. What might it mean to recognize the presence and power of fungi all around us, especially from this different perspective?, he asks.
Bethan Manley, Program Manager Global Data Science at SPUN
Bethan began studying underground fungal networks during a Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge examining Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi and their genetic interactions with crop plants. She has since continued work on the genomics of symbiotic fungi as a Postdoctoral Researcher, and worked as a Senior Computer Biologist at the Sanger Institute, UK, on the Tree of Life Project that aims to sequence all eukaryotic species on Earth.
Bethan now works for SPUN | Society for the Protection of Underground Networks, a non-profit initiative that aims to map, understand, and conserve underground mycorrhizal fungal networks. She will speak about the awe-inspiring work the SPUN team does of mapping underground mycorrhizal networks that regulate the Earth’s climate, and the advocacy and innovation work the organization does to protect and preserve our underground fungi kingdom.
Targeting researchers, practitioners, NGOs, policy makers and other interested stakeholders, the webinar series will investigate forest restoration questions from diverse scientific perspectives, with alternating focus on the global and European levels. This includes exploring practical forest restoration approaches, experiences and challenges worldwide.
Taking place on Wednesday, 14 December from 16:00-17:30 CET, the second webinar on 14 December, when KU Leuven professor Bart Muys will discuss “Biodiversity as a key asset for forest restoration in Europe“!
Targeting researchers, practitioners, NGOs, policy makers and other interested stakeholders, the webinar series will investigate forest restoration questions from diverse scientific perspectives, with alternating focus on the global and European levels. This includes exploring practical forest restoration approaches, experiences and challenges worldwide.
Taking place on Wednesday, 9 November from 16:00-17:30 CET, the first webinar features forest restoration specialistJohn Stanturf as a speaker, discussing the topic “If nature is the solution, what is the problem? A perspective from forest landscape restoration”.
Following webinars will take place every second Wednesday of the month at the same time. Save the date for the second webinar on 14 December, when KU Leuven professor Bart Muys will discuss “Biodiversity as a key asset for forest restoration in Europe“!
Unlocking large-scale land restoration practices, approaches, and benefits in Sub-Saharan Africa
Regreening Africa is an ambitious programme running from 2017-2023 that aims to reverse land degradation on 1 million hectares across 8 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Regreening Africa integrates trees into crop and communal areas along with complementary restoration practices and approaches to enhance inclusion, value chains, policy, and local governance. Five years into implementation, Regreening Africa would like to share its experience and lessons through a roundtable event with all partners.
The Regreening Africa Roundtable will have three sessions:
Session 1: Scaling out context-based practices
What practices will work where and how can we encourage widespread uptake? These are the questions to be addressed in this session as we investigate the many sustainable land management practices in the project and the approaches to scale them out. We will also investigate the impact of both the advisory models and the practices through preliminary impact evaluation results.
Session 2: Regreening Africa science-practice-policy partnership
Integrating data from science and practical experience is critical for improving our planning, implementation, and the policy environment. In this session we explore how community, government, scientists, and development partners worked together and what they have been able to create. We explore examples of integrating scientific data from multiple sources, how partners have been brought together to create initiatives and movements and how we consistently reflected, learnt, and improved the programme over time.
Session 3: Economic and policy incentives
Incentives are known to be a critical driver of landscape restoration and any sustainable land use transition. Farmers and pastoralists are the ones who bring about change on the ground and they must see the benefits. Incentives can come in different forms, but two critical incentives are linked to livelihoods, the economic benefits and to ownership and rights. In this session we explore two examples of value chains and cases of where engagement with policymakers has made practices more accepted and where tree use rights have been enhanced.
Date and time: 6 September 2022, 13:00-17:00 (EAT)
The Eden Festival of Action is an environmental action gathering combining practical ecosystem restoration work like tree-planting, with a full line-up of workshops, talks and activities from sustainability experts. The evenings are filled with campfire sessions, storytelling and music from some of South Africa’s finest musicians.
The event aims to create an empowered regenerative community, equipping you to become custodians of the natural world, moving from commitment to action!
Join our 7-day sustainability experience this October 2022 and create real, long-term environmental impact.
