Publication

Main messages

• Community and smallholder forestry has contributed and can further contribute to the sustainable development goals (SDGs).
   
• Experiences in community and smallholder forestry across a broad array of contexts offer important lessons for progressing towards the SDGs.
   
• Common constraints undermine community and smallholder forestry around the world including lack of fundamental rights (tenure), bureaucratic hurdles, unfavorable commercial arrangements and illegality. All these constraints are considered in specific SDGs as issues that need to be addressed. The success of community and smallholder forestry depends on meaningful progress in these SDGs.
   
• Harnessing the potential of community and smallholder forestry to progress on the SDGs necessitates the development of a supportive institutional setting, unlocking economic opportunities, the realization of education and capacity building programs and a more systematic monitoring of outcomes.
   
• Active collaboration and involvement of an array of stakeholders, including governmental organizations, NGOs, community based organizations and the private sector is necessary to support community and smallholder forestry and their contribution to the SDGs.
   
• Efforts to attain the SDGs can lead to synergies among the goals, but can also lead to trade-offs that can undermine livelihood or conservation goals that can be achieved through community and smallholder forestry.