APFNet Scholarship Students Participating APFNet Thematic Training Workshop

From October 21 to 23, the Asia-Pacific Network for Sustainable Forest Management and Rehabilitation (APFNet), gathered 13 APFNet Scholarship Students from Lao PDR, Myanmar, Mongolia, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Papua New Guinea at our university and APFNet Scholarship Students from Beijing Forestry University to participate the 3-day Thematic Training Workshop proposed by International Union of Forestry Research Organization (IUFRO) on “Scientific Theories Interaction-in the case of forestry landscape restoration”.It is organized by APFNet in partnership with IUFRO Special Program for Development of Capacities (SPDC) and Chinese Academy of Forestry.

Dr. Michael Kleine, Deputy Executive Director of IUFRO, was invited toexplain interactive relationship between scientific fields and policy makers and opportunities and challenges revealed during the interaction. By way of illustrations, he demonstrated the contribution that IUFRO has done to the policy design in the globe. Interacting with the participants from different economies, he discussed with them on incorporating the theoretical knowledge into effective practice and shared his valuable experience in communicating with policy makers. In addition, another two honored representatives focused their presentations on different aspects of the indispensability of forest landscape restoration. Professor John Stanturf from United States Forestry Service mainly discussed how forest landscape restoration contributed to policy making throughout the world; Professor Promode Kant, director of Indian Green Economy Research Institute, elaborated the benefits of forests in climate change mitigation and climate change adjustment.

Going forward, the participating students presented their PPTs closely relevant to the training project. For instance, researches on Myanmar dry land, status of Andes Mountain Agriculture, causes for Lao’s tropical rain forestry deforestation, red woods eco-system rehabilitation, and so on. Owing to their remarkable works, they obtained thematic training certificates issued by IUFRO Special Program for Development of Capacities (SPDC).

On the closing of the thematic training workshop, our students were invited to Regional Congress for Asia and Oceania and consultation session on Early Career Academics Program (ECAP) proposed by APFNet, and the forestry education symposium jointly organized by IUFRO and International Forestry Students Union.