Rural development, the convergence of landscape management models and the participation of society are essential in order to guarantee sustainable forestry management for the future.

Opening

The International Symposium was opened on Monday 21 in the Casa del Cordón in Burgos. Present at the ceremony were Juan Carlos Aparicio, Mayor of Burgos; Jan McAlpine, Executive Director of the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF); Eduardo Rojas-Briales, Director of the FAO Forestry Department; Jacinthe Leclerc, Director General of the Forest Service of the Canadian Ministry of Natural Resources; José Jiménez, Director General for Forestry Policies of the Spanish Ministry of the Environment, Marine and Rural Affairs (MARM); and María Jesús Ruiz, Vice-President of the Junta de Castilla y León and Regional Minister of the Environment.

One of the key themes of this event was the increasingly influential role of forests on political agendas worldwide, attributable to the fact that 2011 is the International Year of Forests. Eduardo Rojas-Briales stressed the fact that “forests play a key role in tackling the challenges ahead”, such as the fight against climate change.

The opening event, held on 21 March, also coincided with World Forest Day.

María Jesús Ruiz highlighted the need “to search for innovative solutions such as Model Forests and Biosphere Reserves”. During his speech, José Jiménez paid tribute to the value of forests by offering a few facts: forests are home to 70 per cent of the Earth’s biodiversity, 50% of the world’s vertebrates and 60% of its flora.

You can see the videos of the presentations here:

http://www.globalforum2011.net/videos_symposium

Theme 1: Ecosystem Goods and Services (ACC Main Room)

• Moderator: Mr. Tim Christophersen, Programme Officer for Forest Biodiversity, Secretariat for the Convention on Biological Diversity

• Keynote: Ecosystem services at the landscape level: Critical issues and future prospects. Mr. Jeff McNeely, Senior Science Advisor, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Landscape Management as a basis for the production of ecosystem goods and services in Acre State, Brazil. Dr. Willian Flores, Professor, Universidade Federal do Acre, Brazil (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Evaluating ecosystem services in transhumance cultural landscapes: Insights for adaptive landscape planning in times of global change. Dr. José González, Professor, Department of Ecology, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Landscape management for forest goods and services: Between wishful thinking and economic forces. Mr. Jean-Laurent Pfund, Research Associate, Center for International Forest Research (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Forests on the Edge: Mapping Threats to Services Provided by America's Private Forests. Ms. Susan Stein, Private Forest Land Studies Coordinator, USDA Forest Service (video) (download here)

Theme 2: Inventory and Monitoring

• Moderator: Mr. Jim Carle, Leader, Forest Management Team, Forestry Department, FAO

• Keynote: Geographic scales, spatial and temporal resolution for landscape perspectives. Mr. Göran Ståhl, Professor, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Sweden (video) (download here)

• Keynote: Stakeholders and frameworks for monitoring and assessment—Uses, users and partners: A case study from Tanzania.Mr. Nurdin Chamuya, Project Co-ordinator, National Forest Monitoring and Assessment (NAFORMA), Tanzania (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Landscape biodiversity monitoring in Sweden. Mr. Hans Gardfjell, Professor, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Sweden (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Challenges and Opportunities for Species at Risk Monitoring: From mountains to molecules. Dr. Gordon Stenhouse, Research Scientist and Grizzly Bear Program Leader, Foothills Research Institute (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Multi-purpose Monitoring and Assessment: Measuring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) for REDD+. Ms. Danae Maniatis, Forestry Officer, Forestry Department, FAO (video) (download here)

Theme 3: Governance

• Moderator: Ms. Jerilyn Levi, Assistant Director, Policy, International Programs, USDA Forest Service

• Keynote: Local Forest Governance and Global Environmental Regimes. Dr. David Humphreys, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Policy, The Open University, UK (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Achieving excellence in managing forests: What governance-related lessons to learn from cases in the three tropical regions. Mr. Cesar Sabogal, Forestry Officer, FAO (video) (download here)

• Case Study: African Model Forests: Cameroon lessons from adaptive collaborative management research in 11 tropical countries. Dr. Chimère Diaw, Director, Africa Model Forest Network (video) (download here)

• Case Study: Governing Resource Conflict in Asia – A precondition for Sustainable Model Forest and REDD+. Dr. Yurdi Yasmi, Manager, Capacity Building and Technical Services, The Centre for People and Forests (RECOTFC) (video) (download here)

• Case Study: European Union actions for improving forest governance. Mr. José Antonio González, Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, Medio Rural y Marino, Spain (video) (download here)

Panel: Future Directions

• Moderator: Mr. Hosny El-Lakany, Adjunct Professor, University of British Columbia (video)

• Mr. Stewart Maginnis, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) (download here)

• Mr. Jose Joaquin Campos, International Model Forest Network (IMFN) (video)

• Mr. Tim Christophersen, Secretariat for the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) (video) (download here)

• Dr. Alain Karsenty, Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD)

• Mme. Carole Saint Laurent (IUCN) (video)

• Mr. José Angel Arranz, Junta de Castilla y León (video) (download here)

• Mr. Claude Garcia, Centre International de Recherche sur les Forêts (CIFOR) (video) (download here)

Closing

• Mr. Jim Ball, President, Commonwealth Forestry Association

Field Trip