Seminar
Sustainable Forest Management and Forest Certification with North Korea

The virtual seminar, which focused on principles of responsible forest management and forest certification was conducted between HSF Korea and forestry specialists from the North Korea. Dr Michael Galante, Director of Climate Forestry and expert in the fields of sustainable timber production and forest certification, informed the participants about the definition, principles and concepts of sustainability as well as strategies to pursue it. He also touched the topic of certification and standardization as well as international treaties and initiatives.

The seminar was organized as two presentations given by Dr Galante, separated by discussion sessions. The first presentation focused largely on the general principles for sustainability concerning responsible forest management. Also concepts and strategies of rehabilitation and restoration were topics of the first part. During the second part, theories and practices of certification and standardization were discussed. The seminar closed by presenting international treaties and initiatives. As take-home messages Dr Galante highlighted the importance of promoting and institutionalizing a learning culture and an adaptive management. According to him, emphasis should be put on maintaining and improving forest quality and restoring degraded landscapes. Therefore, all levels – from national to local – as well as their special needs should be included into developed strategies. Dr Galante also pointed out that participatory management and administrative decentralization is increasingly viewed as the norm in forest management.