Consensus and commitment to save and sustainably manage the world's forests.

• Author: Shepard, Daniel

LONG CONSIDERED A TREMENDOUSLY VALUABLE economic and environmental resource, the world's forests have been shrinking by some 200 square kilometres every day--an area equivalent to the size of Germany every five years. Much of this loss is due to forests being converted to land for agriculture and farming.

The problem is not that the ongoing deforestation and destruction of forests has escaped the notice of policy makers from around the world--it has not--but that until now there has not been a workable global plan to manage and preserve the forests. However, after years of intense debate, countries may have finally found a common ground at the sixth session of the United Nations Forum on Forests with the recent adoption of an agreement to support better forest management through measures that preserve or increase forest covers and help realize their full economic potential, as well as by increased assistance to developing countries.

According to Pekka Patosaari, Director of the UN Forum on Forests Secretariat, the new consensus was not built on any unprecedented ideas or breakthrough agreements, but rather on finding the willingness to focus and implement recommendations already on the table. "All of these ingredients actually have been repeatedly said before", he says, "so there is nothing revolutionary in them. But what is important is that now we have a high level of commitment, and the UN Forum on Forests has taken very important steps to set global rules and normative framework for sustainable forest management worldwide. The commitments on global objectives and means of implementation will be supported by the countries' reporting back on their progress made at the national level on these objectives."

Although the new agreement is not the international treaty or convention for the sustainable management of the forests that some had hoped for, there is reason for optimism that this is a "win" for the world's forests and for the 1.6 billion people who depend on them. Mr. Patosaari is emphatic that this agreement marks a turning point in international forest policy. "I know it is a fact that Member States really want to make progress now. Even a non-legally binding instrument, if it is well-structured and based on what we already have, but moving a couple of steps forward, can really make a difference", he adds. "Political commitment is the key."

And it won't be long before the Member States' resolve is tested. Countries agreed to...