ForInfo Newsletter No 2 4 12 12



NEWSLETTER

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SEIMA, Cambodia
Commercial Community Forestry
Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS)
and RECOFTC are working closely to
develop the business plan for the
Community Forestry enterprise and to
establish links with possible market
partners. Equipment for the harvesting
operations has been identified and will
be procured by the beginning of next
year following the official approval of
the harvesting plan by the Cambodian
Forestry Administration (FA). The trial
harvests are scheduled to commence
by February 2013.
The Pre-harvest Inventory (PHI)
training was provided by the FA, for 3
days in Seima, Mondulkiri. Currently
PHI is being carried out in the field on
60 ha, with a plan for WCS staff to

assess the community capacity to
manage the future operations of the
site. The PHI data processing and tree
selection is expected to be completed
by December, thus enabling FA to
approve the site and the machinery to

be used. The FA will continue to be
involved in the next steps of the
project and will also provide a basic
level training on logging methods in
cooperation with our project staff.
The project’s importance is growing
as a recent survey demonstrated that
income expectations from commercial
harvesting operations were very high
among the community members and
reached a daily peak of nearly
US$50, which is unlikely to be
achieved even with regular forestry

operations. However, all villages have
accepted
a
benefit
sharing
arrangement with the enterprises in
order to address both the need of the
community and social equity.
Coordination and communication
systems between WCS and FA are
being evaluated to ensure the
success of the project, since this is
the first commercial harvesting
operation
undertaken
by
the
communities. The lessons learned will
provide valuable information for
similar processes in future projects.









Cambodia SFM Project
Cardamom Mountains
The project has expanded to
additional pilot sites with further
funding
under
a
new
and
overlapping project, Sustainable
Forest
Management
(SFM),
implemented by RECOFTC and
partners.
The first planning workshop for the

project
was
followed
by
identification
of
45
target
Community Forestry sites, where
subsequent baseline surveys were
carried out. As a result, the ForInfo
interventions will take place in 5
pilot communities were fuel wood
supply and demand will be
assessed in order to improve forest
management
plans.
Enterprise
development
interventions

in
commercial fuel wood and charcoal
production will be developed, taking
into account the local fuel demand.
























  


















 



 

























  











 










 













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BOKEO PROVINCE, Lao PDR
Teak Timber Collaterals in
Microfinance
A teak timber survey is underway, in
villages supported by the Lao Women
Union (LWU). The organization
supports
current
activities
and
monitors the performance of village
saving groups. The survey will
analyze possibilities to use teak stand
inventories and financial valuation of
smallholder teak plantations as microloan collaterals. Provincial Agriculture
and Forestry Office (PAFO) in Bokeo
is fully committed to the project
concept and the initial inventories and
stand evaluations have been finalized.
Identification of microfinance partners
for using the stand evaluations as
collateral will be finalized by the end
of this year. Recently, talks were held
between ForInfo and the German
Cooperative
and
Raiffeisen
Confederation
(DGRV)
on
the
possibility to support the financing of
tree collaterals in Laos, further
discussions are expected.
The methods developed for teak
market value estimation are being
tested in 20 smallholder plantations in
Pakhta district. After a review of the
calculations and assessments, the
first 11 certificates were issued to
plantation owners, and many more will
be certified by the end of this year.
The certificates will state the

commercial value of the plantation,
the coordinates with a locality map,
and recommendations to improve
timber management and quality.
These improvements will focus on
maximizing growth and value of the
plantation trees, thus providing a
reasonable income that will be
competitive with other agriculture
based livelihoods in the region.
Bamboo Management
The first bamboo processing site
and
commercial
scale
pulpprocessing plant is now operational.
Bamboo harvesting, extraction and
transportation demonstrations are
scheduled to commence within the
next two months. Field test sites
were identified together with officers
from the Provincial Agriculture and
Forestry Office (PAFO), the district
authorities as well as the factories’
management.
During the planned demonstration
trials, various techniques and
methods to extract and transport
green and dead bamboo from
natural stands will be evaluated. The
cost-benefit analysis and work
efficiency of small-scale harvesting
and transport technologies, like the
‘Iron Horse’ track crawler, and
hauling by ‘Sulky’, will be compared
to the present methods such as
skidding by buffalo and regular
extraction by hand.

3
July – November 2012, Issue 2

ForInfo Newsletter








 
 



CHUMPORN, Thailand
Work on tree collaterals have expanded in cooperation with the Tree Bank
NGO from Lampang province to Chumporn, Southern Thailand. A database will
be developed containing smallholder tree plantation data. The Database will
include: tree species, basal area and density, size/volume of the commercial
logs, amount of sequestered carbon, current market value, and biodiversity
relevance. The compiled data will provide the basis for issuing a plantation
certificate.
The purpose of developing the tree database is to assist individual plantation
owners to gain support from the Thai government to develop a recognized
mechanism which provides tree growers with information needed to use their
tree stands as collateral for a loan or debt management.
What’s ahead?
A second product planned under this cooperation is a manual on the Thai
smallholder forestry plantation sector, which will elaborate on the laws and
regulations, the gaps in management, utilization, harvesting, transportation, and
processing of logs and sawn timber products from individual and private
plantations. The manual will provide all the information required for landowners
interested in growing tree crops. The manual aims to explain how to obtain all
the necessary legal documentation for growing, harvesting and transporting
exotic and non-exotic tree species in plantations.


 




 




Vietnam
The
global
FSC/GEF
project
(ForCES)
for
certification
of
environmental services, conducted
its annual project managers’ meeting
and international steering committee
meeting, in Lombok, Indonesia in
early November. The need for an
extensive Environmental Services
(ES) market analysis and clear ES
management plan at pilot site level
were emphasized.
The
Netherlands
Development
Organization (SNV), a ForInfo
implementation partner in Vietnam,
has developed environmental service
maps for the Vin Tu and Huong Son
pilot sites in close cooperation with
ForInfo. The maps are available at a
scale of 1:25,000 and 1:50,000. They
illustrate key ES as identified by local
stakeholders. ES include the target

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areas’ watershed boundaries, carbon
density, soil loss potential and
biodiversity, among other such data.
The sets of ES function maps will be
used for planning future ForCES
activities and will inform local
stakeholders in their future planning
and land management activities.
Copies of the maps can be accessed
on the ForInfo webpage within the
next couple of weeks. For more
information
visit:
http://ic.fsc.org/forces-pilot.129.htm

 
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Dow nload the ForInfo brochure
and access other information about the
project from our website at:

http://w w w .recoftc.org/site/resourc
es/ForInfo/

RECOFTC – The Center for
People and Forests

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