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Overview

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has provided vital leadership to international forestry efforts for more than 25 years. USAID’s commitment has spanned the globe and has been at the forefront of international efforts to improve the contributions and conservation of forest resources. From the 1970s energy crisis to current rural livelihood improvement programs, USAID’s interventions have evolved in response. Indeed, USAID hasbeen on the leading edge of efforts to increase fuelwood self sufficiency, protect watersheds, promote community forestry and forest enterprises, and to conserve biodiversity. Regardless of the program emphasis, a consistent element of USAID strategies has been the anchoring role of natural forests.

Purpose of the Study

As the inextricable relationship of communities and forests have become better understood and documented, the importance of stemming the loss of valuable experience and information has become evident. Given shifts in staffing and programming, USAID began to suffer an unavoidable erosion in the valuable knowledge and hard-earned lessons in the management of natural forests. Effective planning today and for the future necessitates a comprehensive look at the past. In recognition of this need and to better serve its missions overseas, the USAID Forestry Team commissioned this retrospective study in an effort to capture the “lessons learned.” The purpose of this study is to capture and highlight the major results of USAID’s history in supporting community benefits from natural forest management. This study, the accompanying bibliographic database, and other materials are designed to assist the agency in formulating and evaluating policy and programmatic recommendations for future natural forest management programming. The report is based on information derived from two principal sources of data; an extensive review of documentation and ten focus-country studies, which included site visits and structured interviews with government officials, USAID staff, USAID partners, project staff, and project beneficiaries.

The management of natural forests has been an integral part of USAID’s overall development strategy since approximately 1980. Prior to that time most USAID forestry activities were focused on two main forestry objectives:

1. The production of woodfuel (in response to the global energy crisis of the early 1970s, and projections of critical wood shortages following Erik Eckholm’s World Watch Institute report in 1975); and

2. Tree planting (plantations, woodlots, on-farm tree planting) as a vehicle to improve the conservation, management, and productivity of key watersheds.

In the case of watershed management, forestry was a vehicle to move activities toward the larger goal of increasing agricultural productivity by buffering surface water runoff and soil erosion while providing diversified goods for household consumption and possible income. Watershed

Many of the references that appear in the list below, organized by Region, were assembled as part of this retrospective Lessons Learned study.

Click on regional map to see a complete list of background files

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Or Click here for Global Programs or Reviews.

You can also click here to view or download the actual reports.

Study Summary	Study Report	Focus Countries