Today Daily Development talks to Adrian Whiteman of the Forestry Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations about how conservation of forests and the needs of the people whose livelihoods depend on them can be reconciled.

DD: Can you tell us a bit about the recently launched report State of the World’s Forests 2014?

AW: This is a flagship report of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) Forestry Department. It comes out every two years and delves into the details of what is happening in the forestry world. The current edition focuses on the socioeconomic benefits of forests. We haven’t really analysed the linkages between people and forests at the global level before, so this report is a first attempt to look at this. In the report, we look at how forests meet different basic human needs, such as energy, food, shelter and water. For example, we analyse how many people use wood to cook their food, how much food is collected from forests, how many people use forest products to build their homes and how many are collecting medical plants to provide their own health care. This is the first time that we have systematically tried to collect these data. 

The second part of the report looks at forestry policies, or what governments are doing to try and help people to meet these needs (in terms of forest management and the way that they organize the sector). This is not usually a major area of attention because forestry policies often focus on conservation and production and many of these informal uses are unregulated or even illegal. This report is trying to address the issue by encouraging foresters to be proactive in recognizing these benefits and trying to help people use forests sustainably when they gather products to meet their needs. 

DD: How did you get involved in this issue and what motivates you to do the work you do?

AW: I want to help countries achieve their goals for forestry. In many cases, this means helping them to try to protect their forestry resources. As an economist, I provide the perspective that forests have to deliver goods and services if people are to protect them. This is something that forestry colleagues overlook at times; protection and conservation of forests is very important to them and they feel it should be justified on ecological and conservation grounds. Although these other benefits are significant, I try to remind the colleagues that many people in developing countries live in forests and they have to get something out of them, otherwise they will convert them to other uses. These local uses and local values are very important for forest management if we want to conserve forests.

Another motivator is being able to do work that is of a technically high standard. To produce high-quality technical work is the reason why FAO was established and if the quality of the work we produce is high, then the recommendations we provide are more likely to be useful and implemented. Even if our work does not lead to changes immediately in a country, quite often we find that the results of our analyses will be adopted in other countries or at a later point in time. 

The collection of high-quality statistics is often underrated, but facts and figures help policy-makers prioritize. We are able to provide both the micro- and macro-level data and analysis that helps both with practical work in the field as well as the numbers that policy-makers need to decide where to focus their attention. For example, there are lots of studies of shea nut collection by women in Ghana, and these are very useful for people wanting to develop these activities, but someone in a ministry interested in women’s empowerment needs to know the total number of women in Ghana collecting shea nuts if they want to develop this activity. Fortunately, FAO often collects and makes available information at both of these levels, and this type of analytical work is an area where I think I can make a useful contribution to international development.

DD: If you were to give one key message to people reading this, what would it be?

AW: That people should be at the heart of forestry policy.