Dehradun:Two days Knowledge sharing workshop on Mainstreaming Landscape Thinking in Natural Resources Management Education for Restoration Impact in BIMSTEC Region: The Way Forward inaugurated on 31 March 2023 by the Director General, ICFRE in Dehradun India. The Worksop is sponsored by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland and jointly being organized by IUFRO, ICFRE and IGNFA, Dehradun. The Workshop aims to formulate strategies and way forwards to mainstream the restoration education at national and international levels.
Key experts from the member countries of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation-BIMSTEC (Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand) participated in the workshop. In his inaugural address Sh. Arun Singh Rawat, Director General, Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE) Dehradun highlighted the issues of land degradation affecting around 3.2 Billion people around the world. He urged inter- sectoral coordination among forestry professionals to deal with land degradation issues and to meet the expectations of society.
Sh. Rawat also urged for training need assessments and training modules for capacity building in the land degradation sector and also insisted upon developing a uniform approach for the BIMSTEC region for restoration education and training key stakeholders. Sh. Bharat Jyoti, Director IGNFA, Dehradun emphasized the importance of the connectivity landscape approach in restoration education and advocated the importance of science communication i.e. conversion of scientific evidence to practical solutions and diffusing to various stakeholders the issues of land degradation in drylands across the world. Dr. Michael Kleine IUFRO-SPDC Coordinator highlighted the issues of worldwide population growth, land degradation in drylands, declining agricultural productivity, and the deteriorating food
production systems, unprecedented migration of people across the world.
He also shared the idea behind the Special Programme for Developing Capacities (SPDC) and its activities in the capacity development of forestry professionals around the world. Dr. Michael Kleine presented the outcomes of the 2022 online knowledge-sharing workshop and outlined the programme of the two days workshop on restoration education at the global and regional levels, global commitments to local action for promoting landscape thinking, gaps and needs of current natural resources education programme related to land restoration in the BIMSTEC region.
