TBI Viet Nam Participates in FGLG International Learning Event

The main goal of the group is to bring together communities who have been marginalized from the forest governance sector, to the people who are controlling forest use in each country, so that there can be improvements in forest management, communication and sustainable forest production. Participants of the learning event traveled to Huế from Cameroon, Ghana, South Africa, Tanzania, Mozambique, Malawi, India, Indonesia, China, the United Kingdom, Australia, and several provinces of Viet Nam. The variety of cultures represented at the group meeting made for interesting and diverse discussions. Along with many individual country presentations, topics such as good forest governance, how to make an impact with small funds, benefits from various forms of media and communication and lessons learnt from FLEGT were shared among the group.

3 members of the TBI Viet Nam staff participated in different sessions throughout the 4 day event, including a forest field visit in Huế province, fish-bowl debates, sharing of achievement and lessons learnt among country teams and presentations on experiences with REDD+, FLEGT, and forest governance challenges and initiatives. Stephanie, TBI Viet Nam Project Assistant, was able to attend the field trip to the Thuy Duong village to discuss and learn about community forest management and village based ecotourism. Overall, the FGLG group was able to observe the villagers' dedication and efforts towards forest protection, but not towards forest management and future planning of harvesting and crop rotation, which are vital for sustainable forestry practice. The group brainstormed with the villagers about future procedures. This FGLG learning event was a good opportunity for TBI Viet Nam to contribute their ideas and knowledge to a global forestry governance group, and learn from the experiences and expertise of forestry workers both in-country and from the global community.