The Inception Workshop of the APFNet Project “Demonstration of Capacity Building of Forest Restoration and Sustainable Forest Management in Viet Nam” convened successfully on 27 October 2010 in Hanoi, Vietnam. Over 30 representatives attended the workshop, including staff from the APFNet Secretariat and officials from the Viet Nam counterparts, i.e. the Directorate of Forestry (Ministry of Agriculture & Rural Development) of Vietnam, Forest Science Institute of Vietnam (FSIV), Forest Sector Support Partnership (FSSP), Phú Thọ Department of Agriculture & Rural Development, Phú Thọ Sub-department of Forestry, the Project sites Thanh Son and Tan Son communes. Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Binh, Deputy Head of the Directorate of Forestry (MARD), Mr. Qu Guilin, Director-General of the APFNet Secretariat and Mr. Luong Van Thang, Head of Phú Thọ Department of Agriculture & Rural Development, attended the meeting and delivered speeches respectively.

Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Binh pointed out that this project was built on the integrated achievements of various projects in community development and sustainable forest management. The implementation of this project would improve the local environment and livelihoods; and through restoring the secondary degraded natural forests, it would increase carbon stock to combat climate change and global warming. Mr. Nguyen added.

Congratulations were given by Mr. Qu Guilin on the inception of the Project, and he also expressed appreciation to the effort of related forestry agencies in Viet Nam. Mr. Qu observed that the Project was the first demonstration project jointly carried out by APFNet and Viet Nam forestry agencies; with joint effort and project activities carried out according to the due plan, expected goals and outputs of the Project would be obtained. The implementation would also be conducive to accumulate experiences and identify successful models to improve local forest management and livelihoods, providing reference for forestry development in Viet Nam and Asia-Pacific region as large.

During the workshop, the project executing agency and the technical assistance agency of the Project introduced the details of the project, such as the project objectives, implementation plan, outputs and technical support system. The implementation and final phase management of the Project were also discussed in the meeting.

This Project of “Demonstration of Capacity Building of Forest Restoration and Sustainable Forest Management in Viet Nam” is among the first pilot projects of APFNet. The 2-year project will be executed by Phú Thọ Department of Agriculture & Rural Development, with technical assistance from Forest Science Institute of Viet Nam and total funds of USD 585,750$. It is planned that model forests, participation of multi-stakeholders and skill trainings on the ground, etc. would be applied in implementing the Project. In the end, the Project will improve forest management of local forest manage agencies and forest owners, advance the skills and tools of the forest farmers in processing the Non-Timber Forest Products, boost the local economy and ameliorate the environment.