the Proceedings of the First meeting of gJapanfs Forest Policy Forumh
The Proceedings of the First Meeting of gJapanfs Forest Policy Forumh on June 9, 2007 at Yoyogi, Tokyo

The inauguration session of "Japan's Forest Policy Forum" was held on June 9th at "Shinrin Juku (Forest Study Room)" in Yoyogi, Tokyo with participants of 10 people.

Through discussing Japan's forest policies in English among the participants and disseminating the results by the internet, the forum is aiming at improving the ability of members in communicating in English and increasing the understandings of foreign people on Japan's current situation of forests and forest policy.

This forum will be held once in two months and every time two reporters will make presentations with discussions to follow. 12 promoters of this forum listed on the annex are either experts of forest policy or persons interested in forest and environment, and have various ecperiences related to forest issues in government organizations, universities, in the field or other carriers.
(To see the list of promoters of this forum, click here.)

The first session of the forum was chaired and opened by Dr. Takashi Fujiwara of Japan Forest Information Review, who has been the key person to prepare for the start of this forum.

First, Dr. Ozawa, former Director-General of Forestry Agency, who is the first advocator of this forum, made a short address. He referred to his experience in the Earth Summit held in 1992 in Brazil. At that time, he noticed the importance of English as a tool of communication with many participants of the congress. However, after he retired and when he participated in some international conferences, as he was with no interpreters to help him any more, he felt keenly the need to brush up his English. Since then, he made efforts in studying not only English but also French and Chinese, and now he felt that languages had helped him indeed. Recently, he had been involved in "Kyoto Model Forest Initiative" and had recommended officers of Kyoto Prefectural Government to study English as well. Lastly, he mentioned that this forum was a good chance to improve communication ability in English, and he hoped that this forum would develop and offer good opportunities to discuss forest and environment issues among many Japanese participants including common citizens as well as government officers and university people.

Second, Mr. Tanaka, former Team Leader of Pantabangan Forest Management Project in the Philippines made a briefing on the background of this forum. Mr. Tanaka, who had been involved in development process of the Forum, told the gthe Outline and course of setting up of the forumh as follows. Dr. Ozawa had suggested him to organize an NPO (non profit organization) or a place like a salon which provides meetings to talk about forests in English so that participants would become interested in forests and also improve their English. Mr. Tanaka said that he preferred to call this meeting a "salon" to discuss more common and soft topics rather than to discuss difficult and professional issues at the so called "forum".

He then mentioned about the "forest study room" activities that Dr. Ozawa had been hosting for 13 years at this meeting room. Here many citizens participated and got to know about forests. He admired Dr. Ozawa's belief that "forest should be supported by many people" and his past efforts of obtaining many friends here. Likewise, Mr. Tanaka emphasized that we should establish a forum which could be called "English version of Forest Study Room."

After this, each participant made self-introduction as following order.
- Mr. Wixon of American Embassy, Mr. McDaniel of American Forest and Paper Association, Ms. Ayuko Ozawa, Mr. England, teaches English in high schools Japan. Mr. Usuki Professor of Toyo University. Mr. Shimizu, Head of International Cooperation Office, Forestry Agency, Dr. Fujiwara of Japan Federation of Wood Industries

In accordance with the schedule, Mr. Shimizu was going to make a presentation as an example of the presentations after lunch, and before this, a short discussion on gthe program of the first yearh and topics of presentations in the coming meetings were discussed. Participants are expected to take turns in making presentations and the titles or themes of the presentation should be presented in early opportunities. So far some members already had expressed the topics. Dr. Fujiwara wanted to talk about "Woodmiles", whereas, Ms. Fuji would like to talk about "education on forests". She was absent and sent a message to congratulate the first session of the forum and encouraged the participants.

The chairperson suggested that topics of presentations do not need to be specific to forest or professional. Mr. Wixom said he could talk about general topic like gworld trade and forest products.h Mr. McDaniel handed out recently published books of "The State of America's Forest" to participants and explained some portions. It was agreed that he would make a presentation about this book in the coming session. This book covers data of global forests and wood products as well as American forests and shows interesting comparisons. Mr. England was interested in the social and economic factors affecting forests especially that in developing countries and the possible support for recycling and forest conservation activities.
Dr. Ozawa will discuss "Kyoto Model Forest", Mr. Usuki will talk about "Eco-tourism and environmental sustainability", whereas Mr. Segawa was thinking of "Tree planting in Africa for preventing global warming".

Besides expressing topics, there were some more comments on the future programs like "guest speakers from JICA(Japan International Cooperation Agency) or ITTO (International Tropical Timber Organization) can be invited depending on topics", and "make an introduction of Japan's forests and forestry on continuing basis will be good because this topic is easy to understand and useful for common people."
(To see the list of tentative topics, click here.)

After this, Mr. Shimizu of Forestry Agency reported as the example of the presentation. His topic was on the result of UNFF7 (United Nations Forum on Forests) meeting.

He explained about the background and the history of the past discussions on forests in the international community in 1980s and after UNCED (United Nations Conference on Environment and Development) in 1992. To overcome the issue of rapid deforestation in the world, and to aim at the sustainable use of natural resources, at the UNCED, Rio Forest Principles in the "Agenda21 (Rio Declaration on Environment and Development)" were adopted and follow-up meetings on forests were organized since then continuously. Last year (2006) in UNFF6 "Global Objectives on Forests" was agreed and this year in UNFF7 "Non-legally Binding Instruments on All Types of Forests" and "Mutli-Year Programme of Work" were agreed. He explained briefly the implications of these agreements on Japan's forest policy and his comments on the "challenge we are facing".

There were some questions and answers like;
-"What is the definition of sustainability?"
- "The definition is not concluded."
- "Forest industries in US has the definition."
- "The definition was already made in Forest Principles in UNCED"
- "Is financial support provided?" "Yes."

(For outline of the presentation click here.)

Finally, there was a comment from a participant that "Today's discussion covered details and may be difficult to understand for common people."

Participants are supposed to pay the member fee of \5,000 for one year and the participation fee of \1,000 for each participation.
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