Responses to challenges and opportunities in enabling and achieving inclusive and sustainable governance of forested landscapes

Weak forest and land governance are important underlying drivers of deforestation and forest degradation. Many local communities depend heavily on forests for their daily livelihoods. They are often disproportionally impacted by deforestation, while their contribution to ecological destruction and their access to possible benefits is often relatively limited. Trends in global markets and policies provide both risks and opportunities for positive change towards inclusive and sustainable governance of forested landscapes. The Forest and Land Governance (FLG) thematic programme aims to help civil society in the GLA landscapes to build their capacity to deal with and manage the risks of international initiatives around the sustainable management of forested landscapes while fully engaging in their development and sharing in the benefits these intend to produce. The work in this programme will complement the work at the country programme level. It aims to bring about change in some of the international policies (both public and private) that are most relevant to forest governance, the accessibility of decision making processes and the capacity and competencies of CSO partners to influence these processes. It also aims to link southern CSOs amongst each other, and to link Southern with Northern NGOs that work on advocacy and policy solutions, so they can learn from each other, share experiences and take joint action.