Asia-Pacific Network for Sustainable Forest Management and Rehabilitation has signed Project Agreement on the project “Demonstration of capacity building of forest restoration and sustainable forest management in Vietnam” with Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Vietnam on the19th, August. The project will be implemented by Phu Tho Sub-department of Forestry over two year period. The total fund of the project is US$ 585,750, among which APFNet grant is US$ 499,750.

The project activities will be carried out in two selected Thanh Son and Tan Son districts in the Phu Tho Province. According to the work plan of the project, 50 ha of NTFP species will be planted in forests and 500 clumps of bamboo species will be planted around stand borders and hill foots to increase and diversify forest products. At the same time, 50 ha of natural secondary forest will be restored by improvement thinning and enrichment planting by high value timber species to increase long term ecological and economic values of the forests in the project districts. In addition, the local communities will be encouraged to participate in the planning and executing of forest management and to establish the relevant regulations and institutions with stakeholders under the resposibility and benefit sharing mechanism. Through the above methods the contribution of forests on hunger elimination, poverty alleviation, environmental services and livelihood improvement will be maximized. Besides the pilot demonstration of forest restoration measures, the project will provide the stakeholders in the peoject district with training courses and study tours on restoration silviculture techniques, growing techniques of NTFP and high value timber species, forest protection and NTFP processing in order to strengthen the managing level of the local forest management institutions and forest owners to improve the NTFP processing technique of the local farmers who are dependent on the forest.

The signing of the project agreement is a milestone for APFNet demostration project management and development.