Participants of the MFF 14th Regional Steering Committee meeting pose for photo. Photo: Supplied
Regional coastal initiative Mangroves for the Future (MFF) is currently holding its 14th Steering Committee meeting in Yangon over the next three days to assess the programme’s achievements over the past year and discuss plans for the years ahead.
The meeting kicked off with the inauguration of the Forest Department, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation into the MFF programme.
Guests of honour at the inauguration ceremony included Mr Khin Maung Ye, Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation;Dr Nyi Nyi Kyaw, Director General for the Forest Department; Ms Aban Marker Kabraji, Regional Director of IUCN Asia;Mr Gordon Johnson, Regional Cluster Leader for UNDP in Asia and the Pacific and Dr Steen Christensen, MFF Coordinator.
“Becoming a full member of Mangroves for the Future marked an important milestone as we work towards the effective conservation and management of coastal resources in Myanmar,” said Mr Khin Maung Ye. “We thank MFF, IUCN and the Board of MFF, including the institutional and funding partners and the MFF full member representatives for having unanimously endorsed Myanmar as a full MFF member at the 11th Regional Steering Committee Meeting, which was held in Cambodia.”
“Today we are all fairly clear about the issues facing the long-term sustainable management of Myanmar’s coastal resources, and the need for coordinated collective action to address them. This is not only for the long term interests of Myanmar, but for the interests of the global environment as a whole,” said Aban Marker Kabraji, in her opening remarks.
Following the inauguration, the Steering Committee reviewed the progress made by Mangroves for the Future – both at the regional and national levels – and approved the work programme for 2018.
The second day of the meeting will highlight the programme’s sustainability plans with a focus on securing funding from Norad and the Green Climate Fund (GCF), a fund within the framework of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
The MFF regional secretariat is currently in consultation with several countries and is working to identify priorities to support the programme’s proposal to the GCF.
MFF has developed a project concept with Norad, in relation to the International Climate and Forest Initiative (NICFI)progamme, that focuses on integrating mangrove forest ecosystems within the REDD+ agenda. In this connection, MFF will be conducting a workshop led by Timothy Boyle,the UN-REDD Regional Coordinator at UNDP Bangkok,on 30 September. The aim is tobuild participants’ knowledge of REDD+ and gain an understanding of how and where mangrove forest ecosystems complement the REDD+ agenda, both from a policy and practical perspective.
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