Forests resources are crucial to the World Bank’s mission of eradicating poverty because of their contribution to the livelihoods of the poor, the potential they offer for sustainable economic development, and the essential global environmental services they provide.

  

Poverty Reduction - More than half a billion people living in extreme poverty depend on forests for their livelihoods. Forests help create jobs, develop trade, and provide housing and other important resources for improving the lives of people.

 

Economic Development - The forest product industry is a source of economic growth and employment, with global forest products traded internationally in the order of US$186 billion, of which developing countries account for 20 percent. In developing countries, forest based employment accounts for 32 million jobs.

 

Preserving Global Environmental Services - Forests are home to about 80 percent of the worlds remaining terrestrial biodiversity. Forests also help maintain the fertility of the soil, protect watersheds and reduce the risk of natural disasters such as floods and landslides.

 

The Bank’s Forests Strategy and Operational Policy  set a proactive course for the Bank’s engagement in the forest sector to maximize beneficial forest outcomes for the poor,  economic development and the environment. The World Bank uses a range of instruments  in implementing its forest strategy.

The Bank views partnerships as essential to the successful implementation of the Bank’s Forests Strategy.

 

Forests and Climate Change - Forests contain twice as much carbon as exists in the Earth’s atmosphere, and absorb about 15% of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions.  Meanwhile, destruction of forests through deforestation and forest degradation are now contributing about a fifth of the planet's carbon emissions, a principle cause of climate change.  So forests offer a unique resource for addressing climate change.  The World Bank is testing opportunities to mitigate climate change and protect standing forests through carbon finance, as well as exploring investments needed to make avoided deforestation work given the other functions that forests serve, and to support efforts in afforestation, reforestation and restoration of degraded forests.  The mechanism being considered for these investments is the Forest Investment Program being developed under the Strategic Climate Fund.