A press release from the AfDB says “This agreement is a first-of-its-kind Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in its forest sector and is backed by a US$10 million concessional loan from the Climate Investment Funds' Forest Investment Program (CIF FIP). It is also supplemented by US$14 million in co-financing from the AfDB.

 

The press release quotes the AfDB Director for Private Sector Department, Kodeidja Diallo, as saying “This project is the Bank’s first direct intervention in forestry through a private sector window and will serve as a pilot in setting the pace for engaging the private sector in sustainable forest plantation management.

 

The concept is replicable and demonstrates how a close collaboration between the public and private sectors can contribute in transforming the future outlook for private sector participation in forestry.

 

Reacting to the Board Approval and on behalf of the project sponsors, Paul Hol, Executive Director of Form International, stated that “this is a breakthrough for private investments in forestry on the continent.

 

I believe that this project and collaboration between AfDB and Form Ghana Ltd can be a very important step to enable the expansion of large scale reforestation and landscape restoration projects in Africa. In this way it can be an important front running project for the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative (AFR100) from the World Resources Institute (WRI) and NEPAD which aims at restoring 100 million ha of land in Africa by the year 2030”.

 

The Form Ghana reforestation project will establish a forest plantation in areas that used to be productive semideciduous forest reserves but that have been severely degraded.

Source : www.ihb.de