Towards equitable partnerships between corporate and smallholder partners: relating partnerships to social, economic and environmental indicators: workshop synthesis

An important means of expanding plantation production and benefiting small-scale producers is through corporate smallholder partnerships that establish agreements for industries to purchase wood produced by other parties, including but not limited to smallholders. The workshop, and subsequent synthesis described in this document, attempted to bring together the perspectives of the private sector, government, non-governmental organizations and research institutions who are actively working on this important topic. The results of this workshop will certainly help in the identification and formulation of ways forward in equitable and environmentally sustainable planted forest management. The output speak themselves, but it is clear that more needs to be done with regard to corporate smallholder partnerships if forestry development is truly to meet the multiple objectives of poverty alleviation and the production of fibre for expanding markets. This document contains the background materials, research papers and country papers from Indonesia and South Africa.