Last week, Toni Ventre, on behalf of secretariat of the MMFN, participated in the Sixth Advisory Group and Knowledge-Sharing Event of the Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism. The event was held in Rome, at the FAO headquarter.
In four days of work, the progress of various FLRM projects were presented by representatives from around the world, especially in the most sensitive areas of the Planet: from Burkina Faso to Fiji, from Pakistan to Malawi, to name but a few. Various sources of funding for projects worth tens of millions of euros whose urgency is not only not in question, but is leading to a growing financial commitment from international bodies and major government agencies in countries participating in FAO's FLRM.
Ecosystem, Forest and Landscape Restoration is evermore included in major international agreements, commitments and agendas and has the coordinated goal of limiting the effects of climate change as well as re-creating conditions of environmental, and therefore social and economic, well-being for the populations of the most fragile countries.
The event was not only informative but also meaningful for connections and discussions. All the participants also shared valuable feedback on how the FLRM can further enhance its support to countries and local communities, giving suggestions on how to improve the quality of the collaboration and achieve the FLRM goals.
In this context, as MMFN Secretariat we signed last July a LoA (Letter of Agreement) with FAO for a Forest Restoration project in the Model Forests of Morocco (Middle Atlas). The project is underway and in addition to field interventions it foresees some exchange visits by experts in the field, in Tuscany and in the 2 Model Forests in Morocco, next spring. It will be an opportunity to further enhance what has been achieved on the subject in Med area, particularly with the post windstorm and post-fire restoration experiences of the past few years and the strategies put in place with a view to prevention and training of technicians and forest workers. The sharing of restoration experiences in the different Model Forests, in the Mediterranean basin and beyond, is a real added value in terms of effectiveness in relation to the awareness of the communities involved and thus in the delicate post-project phases.