National Forest Policy Implementation Strategy (NFPIS) 2021 - 2031.

The government approved the National Forest Policy (NFP) in 1998 to spearhead the development of the forest sector in Tanzania. The National Forest Policy Implementation Strategy will now guide the execution of this policy over the next decade (2021/22 – 2031/32). This strategy addresses four key areas: forest land management, forest-based industries and products, ecosystem conservation and management, and institutions and human resources. It also tackles three cross-cutting issues: HIV/AIDS, gender, and governance. The policy aims to boost the forest sector's contribution to Tanzania's sustainable development and ensure the conservation and management of natural resources for the benefit of both present and future generations. Effective and efficient implementation of this strategy is expected to result in (i) a sustainable supply of forest products and services; (ii) increased employment opportunities and foreign exchange earnings; (iii) enhanced ecosystem stability; (iv) enhanced national capacity to develop and manage the forest sector. The specific objectives of the Policy include (i) ensuring a sustainable supply of forest products and services by maintaining sufficient forest areas under effective management; (ii) increasing employment and foreign exchange earnings through sustainable forest-based industrial development and trade; (iii) ensuring ecosystem stability through the conservation of forest biodiversity, water catchments, and soil fertility; (iv) enhancing national capacity to manage and develop the forest sector in collaboration with other stakeholders.
As for the four areas of intervention, the document envisages (i) for the forest land management, strategies for both natural forests and plantation forests and woodlots, including strengthenins the management of their natural resources and carbon stocks, promoting stakeholder’s engagement in management, tree growing and regeneration, sustainable harvesting of products, and protection through the utilization of alternative and lesser-used forest species; (ii) for the forest-based industries and products, strategies for promoting value addition and diversification of forest products and services, as well as promoting their marketing and trade, of forest products and services, strengthening conducive forest business enabling environment, promoting sustainable harvesting of timber and other forest products, together with the efficient utilization of forest resources; (iii) for the ecosystem conservation and management, the stratgies are directed to protect and promote establishment and management of forest reserves for biodiversity conservation, promote stakeholders’ participation in ecosystem conservation and management, as well as enhance availability of information on biodiversity; (iv) for what concerns institutions and human resources, the document's strategies aim to strengthen the capacity of public and private forestry institutions, promote compliance to the national and international forest management standards, strengthen inter-sectoral coordination, stakeholders’ participation and cooperation at national and global levels.
Concerning the cross-cutting issues, Tanzania aims to (i) reduce the impact of HIV and AIDS infections in the forest sector by mainstreaming HIV/AIDS protection and supportive measures into forest development initiatives; (ii) mainstream the gender equity and equality in the forest sector by encouraging and supporting women, youths and people with disabilities to participate in all aspects of forest development and management; (iii) enhance good governance in the forest sector by strengthening transparency, accountability and rule of law in forestry. Finally, a Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) system shall assess the extent of progress toward achieving policy objectives. The efficiency of the M&E system depends on the system's well-organized components in data collection, analysis, and reporting. The overall responsibility for M&E of the Policy implementation lies within the Ministry responsible for forestry which will coordinate, monitor, and evaluate the overall implementation of the Strategy.