In the Asia Pacific region forests host a huge array of biodiversity, including significant amounts of wild relatives of crops and other useful plants, though much of their value is generally unrecognized. Furthermore, forests are important both for the region’s wood-based industries and also for over a billion rural people. Forests also have an important role in poverty alleviation through the income generating opportunities that various wood and non-wood forest products (NTFPs) offer to local communities, and to the economic sector. Rapid economic development and population growth have greatly affected forests and forestry in the Asia-Pacific region. Despite its economic prosperity, the region is suffering from a lack of policies that could reconcile economic growth with sustainable use of resources, particularly forest ecosystems, which are being severely affected by land use changes.

Several countries in the Asia Pacific region have taken steps to implement sustainable forest management practices. However, there is a need to further promote management of forest genetic resources (FGR) per se within this process. National programmes on forest genetic resources are not well established in many countries in the region. To support national forest genetic resources programmes and regional collaboration between them, The Asia Pacific Association of Forestry Research Institutions (APAFRI) and the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI), together with other national and international partners have initiated the development of Asia Pacific Forest Genetic Resources Programme (APFORGEN).

This initiative reflected the need expressed by APAFRI members to increase information exchange and national capacity in rapidly developing scientific and technical areas, such as biodiversity assessment and conservation methodologies. The programme is also a follow-up to a recommendation by the Southeast Asian workshop on FGR that was held in Thailand in 2001. This workshop recommended specifically that IPGRI, in collaboration with APAFRI, should take a lead role in developing a regional programme to strengthen work on conservation and sustainable use of forest genetic resources in the region.

Resulting from this the APFORGEN Inception workshop was organized in July 2003 at the Forest Research Institute Malaysia with participants from 13 countries (Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, China, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam) as well as from IPGRI, APAFRI, FAO and Danida Forest Seed Centre (DFSC). The objective of this workshop was to note the status of forest genetic resources management in the participating countries and to draft a working programme for APFORGEN.

APFORGEN is initially directed to the above-mentioned 13 countries that participated in the Inception workshop of July 2003 but other countries in the region would be included when the APFORGEN develops. This Programme will also enable the strengthening of national programmes on forest genetic resources and support related capacity-building efforts in different countries. In this regard, APFORGEN aims to function as a facilitator, assisting national programmes in resource generation and regional collaboration. Developing integrated conservation programmes that include in situ and ex situ conservation, community forestry and domestication has been suggested to conserve the plant genetic resources. To find information about the development of APFORGEN, please see the recently launched webpages of the programme (www.apforgen.org ).

In addition to APFORGEN, there are a number of species-specific networks operating in the region. These include the International Neem Network, TEAKNET, the International Network on Leucaena Research and Development (LEUCANET), the International Network on Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR) and the International Centre for Research and Training on Seabuckthorn (ICRTS). In addition, there is already a network for a number of island states, namely South Pacific Regional Initiative on Forest Genetic Resources (SPRIG). The worldwide Tropical Montane Cloud Forest Initiative, focusing on conservation of overall biodiversity, is also operating in the Asia Pacific region and the Asia Pacific Forest Rehabilitation Network (APFReN) was established in 1997. Most of the networks attempt to promote better management of genetic resources of a single species or group of species and the emphasis is often mainly on tree improvement. There is no doubt that it is justified to improve management of genetic resources of these economically important species. However, the focus of the existing networks is often on plantation forestry or agroforestry only while management of genetic resources in natural forests has received little networking attention.

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