Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests and woodlands for associated resources for human and environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands. The science of forestry has elements that belong to the biological, physical, social, political and managerial sciences. Forest management plays an essential role in the creation and modification of habitats and affects ecosystem services provisioning.
The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) is a non-profit scientific research organization that conducts research on the use and management of forests with a focus on tropical forests in developing countries. CIFOR, which merged with World Agroforestry on Jan. 1, 2019, is the forestry and agroforestry research center of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), a network of 15 research centers around the world that focus on agricultural research for sustainable development, working closely with governments and other partners to help develop evidence-based solutions to problems related to sustainable agriculture and natural resource management.
Agroforestry is a land use management system in which combinations of trees or shrubs are grown around or among crops or pastureland. Agroforestry combines agricultural and forestry technologies to create more diverse, productive, profitable, healthy, and sustainable land-use systems. There are many benefits to agroforestry such as increasing farm profitability. In addition, agroforestry helps to preserve and protect natural resources such as controlling soil erosions, creating habitat for the wildlife, and managing animal waste. Benefits also include increased biodiversity, improved soil structure and health, reduced erosion, and carbon sequestration.
Haramaya University (HU) is a public research university in Haramaya, Oromia Region, Ethiopia. It is approximately 510 kilometres (320 mi) east of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The Ministry of Science and Higher Education admits qualified students to Haramaya University based on their score on the Ethiopian Higher Education Entrance Examination (EHEEE).
The International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) is a non-profit, non-governmental international network of forest scientists, headquartered in Austria. In 2019, IUFRO counted 630 Member Organizations worldwide.
World Agroforestry is an international institute headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, and founded in 1978 as "International Council for Research in Agroforestry". The centre specializes in the sustainable management, protection and regulation of tropical rainforest and natural reserves. It is one of 15 agricultural research centres which makes up the global network known as the CGIAR.
Social forestry is the management and protection of forests and afforestation of barren and deforested lands with the purpose of helping environmental, social and rural development. The term social forestry was first used in 1976 by The National Commission on Agriculture, when the government of India aimed to reduce pressure on forests by planting trees on all unused and fallow lands. It was intended as a democratic approach to forest conservation and usage, maximizing land utilization for multiple purposes.
Farmer-managed natural regeneration (FMNR) is a low-cost, sustainable land restoration technique used to combat poverty and hunger amongst poor subsistence farmers in developing countries by increasing food and timber production, and resilience to climate extremes. It involves the systematic regeneration and management of trees and shrubs from tree stumps, roots and seeds. FMNR was developed by the Australian agricultural economist Tony Rinaudo in the 1980s in West Africa. The background and development are described in Rinaudo's book The Forest Underground.
Forest farming is the cultivation of high-value specialty crops under a forest canopy that is intentionally modified or maintained to provide shade levels and habitat that favor growth and enhance production levels. Forest farming encompasses a range of cultivated systems from introducing plants into the understory of a timber stand to modifying forest stands to enhance the marketability and sustainable production of existing plants.
The Farm Forestry Toolbox is a collection of computer programs, referred to as 'Tools', intended to be used by farm forest owners and managers to aid decision making. The Toolbox includes a set of simple 'Hand Tools'; conversion of measurements and map co-ordinates; measuring the volume of stacked logs, slope, basal area; and a survey tool. A second set of more complex tools or 'Power Tools'; can be used to estimate site productivity, volume and value of wood grown for individual trees, at the coupe or stand level and forest estate level.
The Victoria Basin forest–grassland mosaic is an ecoregion that lies mostly in Uganda and extends into neighboring countries. The ecoregion is centered north and west of Lake Victoria, with an outlier on the border of Ethiopia and South Sudan.
P. K. Ramachandran Nair is an Indian American agricultural scientist, Distinguished Professor of Agroforestry and International Forestry at the School of Forest Resources and Conservation, University of Florida. He is known for his pioneering contributions to the science of agroforestry, for which he received global recognition including the Humboldt Prize (2006). The specific areas of his research include: agroforestry in the tropics and subtropics, integrated farming systems, soil carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation, ecosystem services, and soil fertility management. He has written over 200 peer-reviewed articles, 17 books and over 75 book chapters.
Wanjira Mathai is a Kenyan environmentalist and activist. She is Vice President and Regional Director for Africa at the World Resources Institute, based in Nairobi, Kenya. In this role, she takes on global issues including deforestation and energy access. She was selected as one of the 100 Most Influential Africans by New African magazine in 2018 for her role serving as the senior advisor at the World Resources Institute, as well as for her campaign to plant more than 30 million trees through her work at the Green Belt Movement.
The National Agroforestry Policy of India is a comprehensive policy framework designed to improve agricultural livelihoods by maximizing agricultural productivity for mitigating climate change. The Government of India launched the policy in February 2014 during the World Congress on Agroforestry, held in Delhi. India became the first country in the world to adopt an agroforestry policy.
The church forests in Ethiopia are small fragments of forest surrounding Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Churches. Northern Ethiopia was once covered in forests, but due to deforestation for agriculture, only about 4% of the original forested lands remain. Church leaders have long held the belief that a church needs to be surrounded by a forest, and these sacred forests have been tended for some 1,500 years. Aerial photographs of church forests show them as small verdant islands surrounded by vast areas of tilled lands and pasture. There are around 35,000 individual church forests in the region, ranging in size from 3 hectares to 300 hectares, with the average around 5 hectares. It is estimated that these church forests represent the bulk of the remaining forested land in the Ethiopian Highlands.
Higher education in Ethiopia is the lowest in quality of standard relevance and academic freedom, despite an expansion of private higher education and rising enrollment. Higher education supposed originated by Saint Yared music school in the sixth century in line with centuries old traditional education of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. Modern higher education was commenced during the reign of Emperor Haile Selassie with the establishment of the University College of Addis Ababa, now called Addis Ababa University in 1950. It then followed by Haramaya University. By the time, there were only three secondary schools in the country, used as preparatory for college entrance.
The Ethiopian Academy of Sciences is a national academy founded on April 10, 2010. Pediatrician Demissie Habte served as its inaugural president. The founding class of fellows included 50 people across the natural and social sciences. It was started by researchers from Addis Ababa University with support from the Royal Society until 2011. Its founding executive director is plant ecophysiologist Masresha Fetene. Brhane Gebrekidan, an agronomist, is vice president. By 2022, only 9 percent of its fellows were women, the smallest percentage among academies in Africa. It is a member of the Network of African Science Academies.
Masresha FeteneFAAS is an Ethiopian professor of Plant Ecophysiology at the Department of Plant Biology and Biodiversity Management, Addis Ababa University.
