Regional Team for EU ENRTP Caucasus Project Hails Decision by Governmental Agency to Cooperate in the Field of Increasing the Resilience of Forest Ecosystems in Georgia

Important step had been taken in implementation of the EU Financed Project on Increasing the Resilience of Forest Ecosystems against Climate Change in the South Caucasus Countries (EU ENRTP Caucasus). On December 21, 2011 WWF-Caucasus and the Natural Resources Agency of the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources of Georgia signed the Memorandum of Understanding and agreed to work closely together to increase the resilience of forest ecosystems against climate change through cooperation in the field of transforming monoculture forest stands into nature forests in Georgia.

“This is encouraging decision, emphasizing importance of cooperation on forest biodiversity and climate change related issues“ said representative of the regional team for the EU financed ENRTP Caucasus Project, project regional coordinator Malkhaz Dzneladze. “WWF-Caucasus stands ready to support technically and financially all measures necessary to put into action the said decision.”

“The decision had been based on preliminary undertaken baseline analyses and joint field surveys (in combination with participatory planning) for selection of the project pilot site. As a result, Khashuri pilot site of about 80 hectares was selected on the territory of the state forest lands for implementation of transformation measures aimed at transforming monoculture forest stands into nature forests.”

WWF-Caucasus in partnership with WWF-Germany, WWF-Armenia and WWF-Azerbaijan, since March 2011 has been involved in implementation of EU financed Project on Increasing the resilience of forest ecosystems against climate change in the South Caucasus Countries (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia) through forest transformation for the period of 2011-2014.


About the EU ENRTP Caucasus Project

The project description is available from the project website.