The Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) is pleased to welcome the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) to the RRI Coalition. A long-standing RRI collaborator, CIFOR brings to the Coalition a wealth of information and analyses on the relationship among forests, poverty, and the environment, and how management and governance of forests affect the livelihood and well-being of forest-dependent local communities and Indigenous Peoples. This announcement serves to recognize the strong history of collaboration, and now formal partnership, between the two organizations.

“The partnership between RRI and CIFOR is both timely and strategic,” said Andy White, RRI Coordinator. “The world’s natural resources, climate change, human rights, and local people’s land rights and livelihoods are inextricably linked. With so many pressing threats to local people, and opportunities to address them, CIFOR’s extraordinary research capacity and its extensive network will help us ensure that local communities, policymakers, and all those with an interest in forests are aware of the benefits of respecting local rights.”

With over 20 years of forestry research, CIFOR has proven itself an innovative leader in forestry research and policy and a true champion of alleviating poverty in forested areas. The addition of CIFOR to the Coalition will help accelerate the collective efforts of RRI’s Partners and Collaborators in promoting greater global commitment and action toward policy, market, and legal reforms that secure Indigenous Peoples’ and local communities’ rights to own, control, and benefit from the land and resources on which they depend.

“We are looking forward to working with RRI to help strengthen forest policy globally and using our combined knowledge and resources to ensure that forests remain high on the world’s political agenda,” said Peter Holmgren, CIFOR Director General. “Together, we enhance our ability to ensure people everywhere recognize the value of forests for reducing poverty, mitigating climate change, and maintaining resilient societies and ecosystems.”

Founded in 2005 to address insecure land rights in the world’s most forested countries, RRI – a coalition of now 14 Partners and over 140 Collaborating Organizations – is working to accelerate forest and land policy reform in Africa, Asia, and Latin America by promoting greater global commitment and action to secure local peoples’ rights to own, control, and benefit from their lands and resources.

“As a Coalition, RRI’s comparative advantage is a result of the distinct competencies of its Partners and Collaborators, and their strategic alignment to a common agenda,” said Maria Jose Olavarria, Senior Manager for Coalition Coordination and Development for RRI. “In welcoming CIFOR today, we are even better positioned to achieve positive and transformative change in the world’s remaining tropical forests. This is very good news for us, but even more so for local communities around the world directly affected by insecure land and resource rights.”