RPE

The challenges facing community forestry in the Philippines are complex with numerous interlocking causes. To address these interlocking causes, an interlocking operational framework guided this project. It has its anchor ‘on the ground’ with field research to highlight community perspectives pushing a policy envelope, an international experiential training and learning initiative aimed at retuning the skills of forestry professionals, and supporting advocacy processes to ‘close the loop’ maximizing impact through policy advocacy. The goal implied that the project team’s role was not primarily to ‘educate’ or ‘empower’ communities but rather to contribute to ‘release’ their potential to manage forests. Releasing the potential of communities to manage their forests had as much or more to do with changing ‘us’ the professionals and our constructs, as it is about changing ‘them’ the community members. Hence the project activities are focused not only in working with communities but also in attempting to change the barriers to community forestry found within the political economy and within the nature of professional training. The components themselves and their interlocking nature are fitted strategies with the complex challenges making a worthwhile contribution to community forestry in the Philippines, whilst learning from the experience