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4033 SW Canyon Road Portland, Oregon 97221 USA Phone: 503‐488‐2130 Fax: 503‐228‐4608 http://wfi.worldforestry.org WFI Staff Sara Wu, WFI Director 503‐488‐2130 [email protected]
Chandalin Bennett, WFI Program Manager 503‐488‐2137 [email protected] Rick Zenn, Senior Fellow 503‐488‐2103 [email protected]
WFI Fellows Kwangho Baek, South Korea [email protected] Ning Hou, China [email protected] Elvis Tata, Cameroon [email protected] Ali Malekghasemi, Iran amalek‐[email protected] Richard O’Hanlon, Ireland [email protected] Cristhian Gutierrez, Bolivia [email protected]
Volume 11 Issue 1, February 2012
A Word of Thanks to Our Community Support cific Northwest. This
mis-sion is unique amongst forestry organizations. It requires the
continuous support of a wide variety of companies, agencies,
organizations, and people throughout the commu-nity that it is
impossible to simply list them all.
We do our best to show our gratitude and let peo-ple know just
how thank-ful we are and how much their support means to the WFI
Fellows. Whether you have hosted the group or just one of the
Fellows on a field tour or site visit, or have spent time in an
interview, exchanging emails, talking on the phone, giving a
presenta-tion, or having some in-formal discussion - all of this is
important and criti-cal to our program and extremely meaningful to
them.
Outside of the US, Oregon may not be as familiar as California
or New York. But to a forester, Oregon remains a must-see
destina-tion. That is why the World Forest Institute’s
Interna-tional Fellowship Program brings professionals from around
the world to our offices in Portland to con-duct a focused research
project on some aspect of forestry in the region. Their research
projects allow them to focus on one topic, learn what we know about
it here in the US, and then take this knowledge back home and apply
it in their home countries.
In addition to conducting their own research, WFI strives to
give these visiting scholars broad exposure to forestry throughout
the Pa-
As each Fellow returns to their home country to trans-fer what
they have learned, a small piece of Oregon’s proud forestry
heritage is shared with the world.
We are so fortunate to have a community of natural re-source
professionals that are interested and engaged in sharing their
knowledge and expertise. Fellows gain so much from their
interactions with the community - it is the most memorable, useful,
and irreplaceable experience of their time here. Thank you all for
your continued support.
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Three New Fellows Start at WFI Alumni Updates The longer days
and warm-ing temperatures have brought about increased ac-tivity at
WFI. Three new Fellows have started their programs since the
begin-ning of the new year. We are excited to have researchers from
three countries we have not previously hosted: Iran, Ireland, and
Bolivia.
Ali Malekghasemi is from Tehran, Iran. He is a profes-sor in the
forestry depart-ment at Azad University in Iran. His teaching and
re-search interests include us-ing GIS and other spatial technology
to monitor urban forests. Ali came to WFI to gain an understanding
of how our urban forests are managed and monitored. By doing a
comparative assess-ment of the technological methods by which urban
forests are monitored be-tween here and Iran, Ali hopes to identify
key tools that can be used for long-term monitoring of the ur-ban
forest. Ali will be at WFI for six months and looks forward to
exchanging and sharing ideas during his time here.
Richard O'Hanlon is from Cork County, Ireland. He recently
completed his PhD at the University of Limerick where he was
looking at fungal diversity in the exotic Sitka spruce forests. He
comes to WFI to take a look at our native Sitka spruce forests
along the west coast. He will identify components of the native
fungal commu-nity here and make compari-sons with his findings from
back home. Sitka spruce is one of the most widely planted species
in Ireland and understanding the ecol-ogy of the native and
non-native forests is important for biodiversity conservation and
future planting policy. Richard will be at WFI for a six month
Fellowship.
Cristhian Gutierrez is from La Paz, Bolivia. He arrived at the
end of February and will also stay for a six-month Fellowship.
Cristhian works for a Canadian-based company in Bolivia called CO2
Impact. He works on a variety of REDD and Clean Development
Mechanism projects which assist people
living in rural forest commu-nities. While at WFI Crist-hian
will research how pri-vate companies and govern-ment organizations
in the Pacific Northwest market their timber and wood prod-ucts. He
hopes to take home new ideas and strategies for wood marketing that
can improve timber sales and provide better livelihoods in rural
communities.
We welcome all our new Fellows and look forward to learning from
them as much as they will learn from us here in the Northwest.
You can read more about them and their backgrounds on our
webpage “Current Fellows” or by clicking here.
Cristhian Gutierrez Patzi has travelled to countries nearby
Bolivia, but this is his first time to the United States.
Chinese alum Meijuan Luo vaca-tioned in SE China for the Chinese
New Year and sent along a family photo. She is now writing her
doc-toral thesis and should have her PhD in hand very soon!
Ali Malekghasemi earned his PhD in 2010 and has been teaching
forestry classes in Iran since.
Richard O’Hanlon has an under-graduate degree in science
edu-cation and hopes to use this along with his advanced educa-tion
for teaching in the future.
Meijuan Luo and her family on vaca-tion in China during the
lunar new year.
Jagdish was a Fellow in 2010-2011 from Kathmandu, Nepal.
Also currently working on a PhD is our Nepalese alum Jagdish
Poudel. He has returned to the U.S. to start his graduate work at
Mississippi State University in Starkville. Jagdish is studying
forest management as it relates to carbon sequestration and climate
change, research similar to what he was studying here at WFI.
*****
http://wfi.worldforestry.org/index/international-fellowship/current-fellows.html�
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Silver Falls State Park in Winter Recent Events Speaker
Series
Cameroonian Elvis Tata will pre-sent research findings from his
6-month WFI program at our March installment of the WFI Speaker
Series. He studied the use of GIS technology in forest management
and will talk about applicability of use in Cameroon.
His talk is scheduled for March 15 at 4 pm in the Mt. Hood Room
of the Discovery Museum. Please R S V P C h a n d a l i n a t
[email protected] if you are interested in attending.
Winter is a great season to visit one of the most popular state
parks in Oregon, Silver Falls. Even though the tem-perature outside
was a little chilly, the view of volumi-nous waterfalls was worth
the extra layer of clothes we had to walk around in.
Silver Falls is the largest state park in Oregon, just over
9,000 acres in size. It started as just a 100 acre state park in
the early 1930’s and has slowly grown over the years. Park Ranger
Vicki Sink and District Manager Steve Janiszewski met with WFI in
the South Falls Lodge and gave a thorough
history of the park - from it’s inception through their cur-rent
management practices.
Recreation is the top prior-ity for this park. They re-ceive 2
million visitors each year! However, forest man-agement is still an
important component of their opera-tions. They have performed and
continue to do forest thinnings to maintain the health of the
forest in the
park and make it welcoming to visi-tors.
There is 25 miles of hiking trails in the park, but of course
the most popular trail is The Trail of Ten Falls - a 9 mile loop
that takes you past (and some-times behind) ten different
waterfalls.
WFI hit three of the main waterfalls on a short loop out of the
main lodge area. Although the waterfalls were
magnificent at this time, we were told they can be even bigger
following a heavy rain event. “This is the most amaz-ing place I
have seen since I’ve been here” said Camer-oon Fellow Elvis
Tata.
Silver Falls is a great place to visit anytime of year, but the
strength of the water this time of year is always worth the chilly
trek out there!
Park Ranger / District Interpretive Coordinator Vicki Sink and
District Manager Steve Janiszewski spent the morning sharing their
knowledge and love of the park with WFI.
Lower South Falls was in full force this day. Kwangho in the
foreground gives a sense of scale for the size of the
waterfall.
FSC Guest Speaker
WFI had a guest speaker from Scientific Certification Systems
give a talk about FSC certifica-tion in the US and abroad. SCS
‘certifies the certifiers’ and our guest, Kyle Meister, took us
through the complex process of forest certification.
FSC is an important component in the global wood market today.
Understanding the basics of this process helps us understand
big-ger processes in forest manage-ment.
***** South Falls as seen from the bridge over Silver Creek.
From left: Ning Hou (China), Kwangho Baek (Korea), and Elvis Tata
(Cameroon).
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parties for trail maintenance and invasive species control. Last
year alone they had over 1900 park visits by volun-teers to help in
their mission.
Page 4
Recent Events A walk in the woods at the northern tip of Forest
Park was a treat for WFI this Feb-ruary. The Forest Park
Con-servancy (FPC) owns a 38 acre parcel, 29 acres of which have
never been logged. This old-growth patch is full of beautiful, tall
western red cedar and big Douglas fir. FPC Steward-ship Coordinator
Mikala So-roka and Trails & Restoration Manager Matt Wagoner,
led the group on a short old-growth loop hike and gave some history
of the area. This is the only piece of land FPC owns. There is no
active management here - it is strictly a reserve for the for-est
and is used for education and recreation. Otherwise, FPC uses their
resources for conservation and restoration projects throughout the
greater Forest Park area. They organize regular work
Standing under one of tallest Douglas fir trees on the trail,
Chinese Fellow Ning Hou commented on its presence, “It is like a
rock” she said, no doubt attributed to its great stature in the
forest.
From left: Kwangho, Ali, Rick Zenn, Elvis, and conference
attendee Tom Kaine, National Tree Farm Inspec-tor from
Tennesee.
The ancient forest at the northern end of Forest Park is used to
edu-cate people about old growth in the region.
From left: Ali Malekghasemi (Iran) and Elvis Tata (Cameroon)
were recognized by conference leaders for their attendance at the
one-day Urban Ecology and Conservation Symposium.
Conferences and Meetings
Folks from WFI and FPC stand at the base of an old Douglas Fir
that is estimated to be around 200-250 years old.
Fellows attended the opening re-ception for the American Forest
Foundation’s leadership confer-ence held in Portland in February.
The reception was held in WFC’s Discovery Museum. They met with
local landowners as well as forestry educators from around the
nation that were attending the event.
Exposure to experts in their field of study is crucial for
Fellows in this program. One of the best ways to make this happen
is through attendance at relevant conferences.
Of late, there have been many opportunities for Fel-lows to join
in on important meetings.
One such event was the Urban Ecology and Conservation Symposium
at Portland Sate University. “This was the best conference I have
been to here, it was directly related to my project” said Iranian
Fel-low Ali Malekghasemi. Fellows also attended OFRI’s Forest and
Water Symposi-umm held at OSU as well as the Forest Health in
Ore-gon: State of the State 2012 conference also held at OSU. The
latter was focused on pest and disease issues in Oregon forests and
provided a good overview of the ‘hidden’ ele-ments affecting our
forests. No doubt many future oppor-tunities will arise for this
group and we hope to see you - our experts - there in atten-dance
as well.
Forest Park Conservancy’s Ancient Forest
From left: Elvis (Cameroon), Kwangho (Korea), Chandalin (Program
Manager), and Ali (Iran) gathered for the AFF reception.
Fellows also spent some time at the reception with WFI Director
Sara Wu.
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Page 5
WFI Feature Article - Cameroon
Some of the most difficult challenges that I have faced in my
life have never been as great as the challenges faced by my native
community in the Takamanda of Camer-oon. Fortunate to have grown up
in another community, my passion has been to assist these native
forest people in living a higher quality life, to somehow raise
them up from their extreme poverty. I sought edu-cation as an
answer. Today, I stand as the first Takamanda person to have
travelled to the U.S, taking a high-level training on forestry at
the World Forest Institute. As a fellow with WFI, I am having world
class trainings, visiting conservation areas and meeting top
personalities in the forest in-dustry of the Pacific Northwest
region of the United States. In general, Cameroon has 57 different
for-est conservation schemes – all of which are unable to provide
livelihood alternatives to indigenous forest people. One of the
most serious problems is that community forests get turned into
legally ‘protected areas’ and this takes the right of use away from
the indigenous people. This management scheme stimulates conflicts,
illegal use of forests, broadens poverty levels and exac-erbates
deforestation rates. Community governance is best placed to handle
this situation. However, even though Camer-oon is within a
biodiversity hot spot, it has weak governance. In addition, close
to 90% of forest community leaders (chiefs) lack stewardship in
conservation manage-ment. One of the reasons I came to WFI was to
learn tools and strategies for affect-ing change in these
communities. To effectively impart lessons from what I’ve been
learning while at WFI, I propose to, amongst other things, work
with Cam-eroonian-based conservation, socio-economic, and
communication consultants to train/coach 149 traditional rulers in
156 different Takamanda villages. The aim is to empower chiefs so
that they work to improve sustainable livelihood options for the
8000 indigenous people in these vil-lages. This approach will
increase the con-fidence the community has in the chief to
Elvis Tata is from Yaoundé, Cameroon and is working on a 6-month
Fellowship at WFI.
increase value from protected forests and enhance participation
in conservation. Be-fore coming to WFI I worked with five chiefs
towards this goal, and had some results, but feel I still need
additional man-agement knowledge to be successful. With experiences
and knowledge achieved while at WFI, I propose to organize
train-ings for the chiefs twice a month for two years. Some methods
of delivering this information to the chiefs could be through
audio-visual trainings, simple conservation ethics training, and
modeling of how to channel petitions to local organizations and the
government. Such trainings could streamline processes, such as
reducing the petition channeling process from two months down to
two weeks. Some 15 ma-jor Common Initiative Groups (CIGs) in all
these villages will benefit once their chiefs have this type of
knowledge. CIGs are farmer groups and local organizations of wild
products’ gatherers acting either as market or labor cooperatives
for mutual assistance. Chiefs are traditional board members to such
groups. The groups’ ca-pacities will therefore be improved upon
with contribution from trained/empowered chiefs. I hope this
transfer of knowledge will breach the information gaps and ad-dress
tribal conflicts over forestland. Ulti-mately I would like to see
these trainings set a certification system for traditional rulers
in all 52 protected forests of Camer-oon, making them globally
recognized as conservation leaders in the entire Congo Basin.
Knowledge gained here can be directly transferred to Cameroon. For
example, the connection the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge in Washington
makes with the Native American tribes in the region about
envi-ronmental awareness and land manage-ment plans can be adapted
to suit the wild-life protected areas of the Takamanda. For many
years, native Takamanda people pre-served parts of their forest
either as wild-life sanctuaries or as a heritage for tradi-tional
rites. Should they call these areas heritage lands and assign tree
species as
heritage trees? This question arises from information gained
from Dr. Phyllis Rey-nolds and her team who worked on the heritage
tree program in Portland and got success on the streets and in the
legisla-ture. I learned these strategies and term it ‘a bold idea’
for Cameroon. Using these experiences for teaching in Cameroon will
be an innovative ap-proach. It will engage the oldest and most
reliable institutions of traditional govern-ance - the chieftaincy
- to leverage work in conserving forest from examples learned in
the United States, where con-servation movements and environmental
education took their strongest foot holds the world over.
Nonetheless, financial support is needed for these trainings. While
at the World Forest Institute, I am gaining skills in Geographic
Information Systems (GIS), as well as knowledge on non-profit
man-agement. After my fellowship, I will sug-gest adaptable GIS
options to forest pol-icy makers in Cameroon, further my
edu-cation, and seek support to enhance con-servation trainings for
chiefs. This to me is a passion and an effective way of tell-ing my
people my story “Meu feu quembe, Meu feu quembe” meaning: ‘I
learned something, let’s share’.
Forest conservation and traditional governance in ‘protected
areas’ in rural Cameroon. By Elvis Tata
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