Mr. AK Bansal, Chairperson, SDG-NWFP, NCCF, and Mr. A K Srivastava, Director General, NCCF participated in the 10th Project Directors Meeting of JICA assisted Forestry and Natural Resource Management Projects, held at The Park, New Delhi on Friday, September 20, 2019.

Presentations were made on the theme “Consolidating Gains of JICA Forestry and NRM Projects in India through Forest Certification”. Many speakers highlighted the need for certification of various constituents of our natural resource base to enhance the environmental, economic, and social impacts of the JICA Projects.

During the presentation, it was discussed that certification of forests, Trees outside Forests, NWFPs, Wetlands, Quality Planting Material and Ecotourism, etc will certainly accord branding and international recognition to the forest sites/other landscapes developed under the JICA projects, apart from ensuring continuous improvement in management, stakeholders engagement and diverse benefits to the communities, price premium on the products and better markets, strengthened biodiversity conservation and environmental safeguards.

It was heartening to note from various presentations that 4th generation JICA assisted Forestry and NRM Projects are focussing on carbon mapping, incentivizing for climate change mitigation, catchment protection, monitoring of water bodies, intensive utilization of technology, and sustainable livelihoods. Forest certification is an emerging global movement and gradually taking its roots in India. There is a strong case that JICA pushes for certification of natural resources in its 4th generation projects.

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