In late June, 2017, EfD will formally launch its latest cross-center research initiative: the EfD Forest Collaborative (FC), a 'community of practice' focused on evaluating the impacts of the decentralization and devolution of forest governance in developing countries.
Led by Randy Bluffstone and Allen Blackman, the Forest Collaborative had a preliminary organizational meeting at the Annual EfD Meetings in Chile in October. Its first dedicated workshop will be June 27-28 in Athens, Greece, just before the EAERE meetings.
The Forest Collaborative research program comprises of approximately 20 participants from EfD centers around the world, and a select group of non-EfD experts including Arun Agrawal (University of Michigan), Erin Sills (North Carolina State University), Kelly Jones (Colorado State University), Daniela Miteva (Ohio State University), and possibly others. Although there is no shortage of folks working on forest governance decentralization and on impact evaluation of forest policies, The group expects to make an important contribution via its broad geographic representation and focus on the intersection of these two topics.
The plan is to have two meetings per year, one in the Spring (usually coincident with EAERE meetings, this year in Athens) and a second at the EfD Annual Meetings (which rotates among EfD centers and which will be in Ethiopia in 2017). At these meetings, Forestry Collaborative members will:
present papers and projects, provide feedback on papers and projects;discuss opportunities for collaboration; discuss special issues/symposia and other outlets for FC work; and discuss potential funding opportunities.