"Expanding Korea's Status through the World Forestry Congress" - Performance Announcement by Choi Byung-am, Korea Forest Service Chief

Choi Byung-am, Administrator of the Korea Forest Service, is announcing the achievements of the 15th World Forestry Congress and the future direction of forest policy at the government Daejeon office press room on the 11th. Photo by Korea Forest Service

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] “By hosting the Seoul Forest Assembly, Korea has established a stepping stone to expand its contribution to the international community in the forestry sector as a leading country responding to the climate crisis.”

On the 11th, Choi Byung-am, Administrator of the Korea Forest Service, introduced the significance of hosting the ‘15th World Forestry Congress’ recently held in Seoul at the Government Complex Daejeon.

The Korea Forest Service held the Forest Assembly from the 2nd to the 6th at COEX in Seoul. It was reported that about 15,000 forestry sector officials from 164 countries attended the assembly. This is the largest scale of participants in history.

Administrator Choi cited as major achievements the adoption of the ‘Seoul Forest Declaration’ at the Seoul Forest Assembly, the dissemination of Korea’s excellent forest policies to countries around the world, laying the groundwork for strengthening cooperation in the forestry sector with the international community, and announcing international forestry cooperation projects to lead climate crisis response.

In particular, the Seoul Forest Declaration is meaningful in that it establishes the role of forests necessary to overcome crises facing humanity such as climate change, biodiversity loss, land degradation, and poverty, and includes a commitment by the international community to cooperate in solving these problems through forests.

The main contents of the Seoul Forest Declaration include ▲ integrated global ‘forest’ management that breaks down boundaries between political, social, and environmental fields ▲ expansion of investment scale necessary for restoring degraded forests (more than triple by 2030) ▲ establishment of an innovative green finance system for forest protection, restoration, and sustainable use ▲ establishment of a sustainable wood utilization system for changes in architectural culture, circular bioeconomy, and climate neutrality ▲ pandemic preparedness through forests ▲ efficient forest management based on objective data.

Administrator Choi also emphasized the significance of widely promoting Korea’s excellent forest policies to the international community through hosting the Seoul Forest Assembly and strengthening cooperation between international organizations and countries worldwide in areas such as forest restoration and welfare expansion.

Choi said, “As the host country of the Seoul Forest Assembly, Korea led discussions for five days, creating an opportunity to share Korea’s excellent forest policies as a successful greening country with countries around the world. Above all, special events such as the Wildfire Forum and the Peace Forest Initiative (PFI) high-level meeting were filled with time to share Korea’s excellent domestic forest policies, which have been developed under the leadership of the Korea Forest Service, with other countries and to lead international forest issues, thereby solidifying Korea’s position as an advanced forestry nation.”

Meanwhile, the Korea Forest Service achieved results at the Seoul Forest Assembly by launching an integrated forest risk management mechanism in cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and developing a vulnerable forest ecosystem restoration project (SAFE) contributing to the ‘UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration’ in cooperation with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.