EFF Program Overview
STRATEGIC PLAN 2008-2011
A two- day staff meeting was held in March 16th and 17th to review the PNG Eco-Forestry Forum’s Strategic Plan. The overall objective of the meeting was to strengthen EFF’s institutional capacity and enhance the effectiveness of it is work by ensuring program staff understood the Strategic Plan and their work programs were compatible and complimentary.
The meeting provided an opportunity for all program staff to review the background and detail of the Forum’s Strategic Plan. The staff gained an appreciation of the reasoning behind the strategic objectives and how outputs contribute to the outcomes and the outcomes to the realization of the objectives. The meeting also provide for the staff to review and make minor but significant update changes to the Strategic Plan especially to incorporate wordings of REDD in some texts.
FORUM’S GOAL
The Forum’s own Goal and Vision are aligned with the National Goals and Directive Principles and in particular the 4th National Goals and Directive Principle that deals with natural resources and environment. The Forum’s Goal is focused on three strategic objectives. These are (i) to ensure our laws and policies promote sustainable forest management (SFM) and; (ii) that there is good governance in; and (iii) that we have a strong civil society.
FORUM’S PROGRAM
The program of the Forum is broken into three thematic areas Law, Climate Change and Information.
1. LEGAL PROGRAM
The legal program seeks legal interpretation of existing forestry laws as well as declare the East Awin and Kamula Doso forest allocation illegal thus protecting one 1 million hectares of primary forest from the threat of logging.
At the moment both East Awin and Kamula Doso there is a Judicial Review, an injunction has been granted preventing any logging until the court cases are determined. In December 2009 Rimbunan Hijau lost two court cases against the Forum. The legal cases were brought by RH in 2006 claiming damages for defamation over two legal cases of our members by written articles by the Forum and published on its website and in the Post Courier.
2. CLIMATE CHANGE PROGRAM
In view of the current trends in response to the climate change debate the Forum also seeks to gain the support of the international community, on key issues before a successful REDD program could be implemented in PNG. They include: Governance, Free Prior Informed Consent, Equitable Benefit Sharing and Landuse Planning. The Forum aims to see a REDD mechanism that benefit people and Parliament to enacts laws to achieve this.
However, to date the government is still preparing its so called Low Carbon Development Strategy.
The Forum planned four regional road shows to address the many issues that arose from Carbon Trade and climate change issues in the country. There were much publicity from the beginning of this year of carbon trading projects in the East Pangia, April Salume, Aitape/Lumi and Kamula Doso. Other rumored projects included one in Morobe and Crater Mountain. The Forum facilitates these road shows to provide; (i) deeper understand on issues of climate change; and (ii) an avenue for open discussions and brainstorm to share knowledge and experiences on issues of Climate Change with relevant stakeholders; and (iii) an opportunity to bring all relevant stakeholders so each can appreciate different roles they play in the implementation of any REDD process in the country.
The road show was held in Madang in March and the second tentatively is planned for June in Port Moresby for the Southern Region. There will be two other more, one for the Highlands and the New Guinea Islands regions respectively.
3. INFORMATION PROGRAM
The Forum’s information program provides the Forum’s members and SFM influences, the facts and other relevant information. The program is responsible for press releases, reports and other publication required to support the Legal and Climate Change programs including the Forum’s donors, administration and finance staff and the Members.
