The joint UNECE/FAO Forestry and Timber Section supports the activities on forests in the UNECE region, provides the Secretariat to the UNECE Committee on Forests and the Forest Industry and the FAO European Forestry Commission, and works to implement the UNECE/FAO Integrated Programme of Work (IPoW).
The overall goal of the Integrated Programme of Work is to “support member States and regional economic integration organizations in their efforts to sustainably manage forests so that they provide forest goods and services to benefit society”.
In line with the continued efforts of the UN System to enhance coherence and “Deliver as One” the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) formalized their over seventy-year old partnership in an agreement to support the implementation of the an integrated programme of work on forestry.
In 2017, UNECE and FAO celebrated seventy years of cooperation and joint work in the region. The UNECE Committee on Forests and the Forest Industry and the FAO European Forestry Commission were both initiated with the task of mobilizing wood for Europe’s reconstruction and to assist in correcting centuries of misuse of forestlands in 1947. From this simple and purposeful aim, the joint work has evolved into the sustainable management of forests and ensuring the provision of many other goods and services provided by forests.
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