ATIBT participated in ACSFI - FAO meeting

The opening remarks were made by Ms Beth Bechdol, Deputy Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), followed by an overview of the Strategic Review and Strategic Framework of the Committee.

The ACSFI is a unique, private sector focused body within the FAO Forestry Division, created to support FAO in its mission to develop, support and strengthen the global forest sector.

The Committee members provide FAO with valuable advice, industry insight and links to global stakeholders.

The FAO ACSFI Strategic Framework 2020-2030 was developed to ensure that the Committee had continued relevance and impact over the coming decade. It is based on the ACSFI Strategic Review, which was conducted to assess the potential of the Committee in the context of global issues affecting the forest sector.

The Strategic Framework has been endorsed and will be made available in the week before the Committee on Forestry (COFO) meets, that is from 5 to 9 October 2020.

In essence, three priority initiatives have been identified for the short and medium term:

Response to the COVID-19 pandemic by the forest sector, e.g. by sharing of lessons learned of forest industries’ responses to Covid-19 and identifying requirements for the forest industry to ‘build back better’;
Positioning the forest sector in the circular bioeconomy, e.g. by identifying and disseminating good practices as well as related capacity building to support the development of innovative forest product value chains in the forest bioeconomy; and
Forest ecosystem restoration, e.g. by facilitating support of the forest-based private sector to the aspirations of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and strengthening of partnerships to enhance capacities for sustainable forest product value chains to deliver livelihood and ecosystem benefits. This initiative will continue beyond the short-term as it coincides with the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.

ATIBT actively participates in the Committee’s activities and is represented its President. Other members include high level forest-based industry representatives from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, USA, Finland, France, Ghana, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, Turkey, and United Kingdom.