10 July 2014, EUFLEGT news - For the fifth year in a row, the Improving Forest Governance course brought together forest governance practitioners from government, civil society and the private sector. Forty-two individuals from 13 countries took part, including, for the first time participants from three Latin American countries – Colombia, Honduras and Guatemala. The course is taught in English, French and, as of this year,  Spanish.

Organised by the Centre for International Development and Training at the University of Wolverhampton, the six-week course offered comprehensive training to practitioners engaged in forest governance issues in their home countries. It provided an opportunity for reflection and knowledge sharing, and it focused on practical ways to improve forest governance. The course encouraged discussion in an educational setting among a broad range of stakeholders from countries in Africa,  Asia and Latin America.

Most participants came from countries engaged in the VPA process, but the topics discussed in the course were equally applicable to forest governance in other countries. The topics included:

• the role of multistakeholder processes in enhancing decision-making processes in the forest sector • evolving timber markets • undertaking participatory planning • the challenges to communicating about progress in forest governance.

The course was funded  primarily by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and the EU FLEGT Facility with additional funding from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), the Germany development cooperation agency (GIZ) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Source: www.euflegt.efi.int