The Timber & Forestry Training College, the PNG Forest Department

The Timber & Forestry Training College, the PNG Forest Department, and TFF complete upgrading training for FD field staff ….

It has long been recognized that the PNG Forest Authority field staff who are responsible for direct oversight of the private sector forest concessions, need upgrading and training. This need was identified under the RAFT-2 program and formally included in TFFs suite of activities in PNG under the new RAFT3-AG program.

TFF has been able to facilitate meetings between the staff of the TFTC and the PNG Forest Department which lead to the development of a training curriculum and the delivery of two training workshops.

The forestry sector, Papua New Guinea Forest Authority is one of the three major income generation sources in the country, beside minerals and agriculture. It provides skill employment to Papua New Guineans and contributes to rural infrastructure development. Therefore, logging practices should be controlled to avoid adverse effect and impact on the social, economic and environmental benefits of the livelihood of communities living in the forest. The climate change caused by forest degradation and deforestation has affected many small islands (countries) in the Pacific region.

It is therefore vitally important that PNG Forest Authority staff must be well versed with management tools and sound sustainable forest management techniques to ensure Forest Act and its regulations as under pinned in Planning Monitoring Control Procedures (PMCP) and PNG Logging Code of Practice (PNGLCOP) are satisfactorily implemented.

Under the National Forest Policy the multipurpose nature of the forest resource including environmental conservation, recreation, provision of subsistence and cultural requirements including the supply of timber and other forest products are clearly defined. The promoting sustainable forest management practice is vital where it can be achieved through implementing the Two (2) major elements of the forest regulations known as Planning Monitoring Control Procedures with PNG Logging Code of Practice.

Furthermore the National Government budget priority is more focus to infrastructure development, the budget allocation for the Government departments and statutory bodies including PNGFA becomes a great concern every year in terms of providing adequate budget to execute service delivery to Papua New Guineans. Field Officers need therefore be vigilant in facilitating the collection of levies so that funds derived from logging are received on a timely manner and channelled to other development purposes in time. The field Officers need to know the requirements of their roles and responsibilities and the expectation placed on them by the management in all aspects of monitoring, evaluation, and reporting Timber permit operations.