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NFP Facility Partnership

Laos Laos

The Facility established the partnership with Lao PDR in April 2007 with the overall objective to assist the country to create comprehensive national code of practice for plantation forestry development and related guidelines to strengthen the legal and institutional enabling framework for the sound management of forest plantations, and to strengthen positive impacts of forest plantations development projects with particular focus on social and environmental aspects. The partnership was officially launched through an "Nfp for All" workshop in June 2007 in Vientiane. A key outcome of the workshop was the identification of four priority activity areas to receive Facility funding, all focused on implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines for Responsible Management of Planted Forests. Specific activities under the partnership are (i) to create a comprehensive national code of practice for plantation forestry development and related guidelines to strengthen the legal and institutional enabling framework for sound management of forest plantations; (ii) to strengthen positive impacts of forest plantation development projects and (iii) to strengthen mechanisms for multi-stakeholder participation in preparation and implementation. The partnership intends to serve as the technical basis for responsible plantation investment and to provide standards by which the social, cultural, environmental and economic values may be balanced.

The total support from the NFP Facility to Lao PDR is $300,000 till mid 2012. The grant is provided to national forest programme stakeholders (government and non-government) to carry out activities in relation to policy formulation and implementation, capacity building and information/knowledge sharing, through contracts (Letter of Agreement) directly signed between NFP Facility and the recipient organizations. Currently, there are five Letters of Agreement are being implemented in Lao PDR. Four of them are focusing on the implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines for Responsible Management of Planted Forests and one is on improving young people’s understanding and knowledge about sustainable forest management and diverse values that forest and nature resources provide to both rural and non-rural populations in Lao PDR. The main stakeholders participating in implementation include government agencies, universities and forest research institute.

Points of Contact

01 Jul 2007

Assessment of the nfp

In order to assess the progress and status of the nfp process, the Facility and FAO have designed a matrix to provide a clearer picture of how the country nfp processing are evolving, which elements are well developed and which elements remain weak and in need of further attention. The matrix has been tested in the countries to ensure the relevance of its indicators.

The matrix contains indicators for each phase of the nfp process: analysis, policy formulation, implementation and monitoring and evaluation. The indicators are clustered according to the primary nfp principles: country ownership, inter- and intra-sectoral linkages, partnerships and participation.

The matrix below was completed by stakeholders, in a participatory way, during a national workshop.

Each indicator was rated as follows:

the indicator has not been developed
the indicator is absent from the country nfp process
the indicator exists but is incipient
the indicator is progressing well within the country nfp process
the indicator is completed to the country’s full satisfaction - can serve as a model for others to follow

Implemented Activities