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Regional Forestry Cooperation
DAFF collaborates with Australia's regional neighbours to shape and manage key forestry issues by participating in regional forums such as:
- Association of Southeast Asian Nations
- Asia Forest Partnership
- Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
- Asia Pacific Forestry Commission
- Forest Law Enforcement and Governance – East Asia and Pacific
Australia and Indonesia
A meeting of the predecessor to the (WGAFFC) in June 2006 decided to include forestry as an area for cooperation between the two nations.
The purpose of the working group is to maximise opportunities and increase and strengthen cooperation between Australia and Indonesia on trade and investment in food, agriculture and forestry.
The new Forestry Taskforce met for the first time on the 29 August 2007, as part of the 13th Meeting of the Working Group held in Australia on the Gold Coast. Discussions were held on the role of the Forestry Taskforce in:
- forest conservation projects
- fire management projects
- a consistent approach by both governments to combat illegal logging
- sustainable forest management.
The next WGAFFC meeting will be held in Indonesia in 2008.
Australia and Malaysia
The Malaysia-Australia Agricultural Cooperation Working Group met in Putra Jaya in August 2007 and agreed to consider expanding the role of the Working Group to include forestry issues.
Australia and Korea
In May 2007 in Canberra, the Korea-Australia Forestry Cooperative Committee agreed to: hold an investment workshop on Korean investment in Australian plantations and Australian forest product export opportunities to Korea, and arrange an exchange of forestry professionals between Korea and Australia.
The Forest and Forest Products Investment Workshop 
PDF [182kb] in Seoul is to be held in the third quarter of 2008 by DAFF and the Korea Forest Service to further develop international forest trade between Australia and the Republic of Korea.
Australia and China
There are two separate agreements between Australia and China for agricultural cooperation, they are the ACACA and the ATC program. Both agreements have the mutual benefit of enhancing trade opportunities between the two countries.
ACACA was signed in 1984 to:
- enhance cooperation in a wide range of agricultural sectors
- develop agricultural trading relationships
- provide a forum for the exchange of scientific information.
ACACA funded projects have included:
- Cooperation between the NSW Rural Fire Service and the Chinese State Forestry Administration to investigate forest fire management arrangements in fire prone provinces of China (2000) PDF [195kb]
- Introduction of provenances and potted seed orchard techniques for Eucalyptus nitens (2001) PDF [2mb]
- Salt tolerant eucalypts for the dual role of landscape recovery and commercial forestry (2004) PDF [4mb]
- Building capacity between Australia and China on forest certification (2007) PDF [2mb]
In 2008 ACACA will fund a Chinese project to improve the productivity of Eucalyptus, especially cold tolerant eucalypts such as Eucalyptus nitens. As part of this project Australia will host a Chinese delegation from the International Forestry Cooperation Center of the Chinese State Forestry Administration for the Forestry Development of Fujian Province.
The ATC program was signed in December 2005 as a capacity building initiative to further technical exchange with China in sharing agricultural knowledge and skills in a mutually beneficial way.
A forestry project is currently funded by ATC for a Benchmarking Study between China’s draft forest certification scheme and the Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes, including comparison to the Australian Forest Certification Scheme. The next ATC funding round is expected to be advertised in April/May 2008.
