Forest-Smart Programs
Forest-smart is a development approach that recognizes forests’ significance for sustaining growth across many sectors, including agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and water. It transforms how sectors operate by identifying opportunities for mutual benefit and creating practical solutions that can be implemented at scale. Working across sectors and with a variety of partners is fundamental to the forest-smart approach as such collaboration generates new understanding and innovation about how forests contribute to other sectors for better development outcomes.

PROFOR’s forest-smart programs are translating the forest-smart approach into action on the ground for improved food security, job creation, resilience, and climate change mitigation and adaptation. Led by experts from sectors that historically have had adverse impacts on forests, the programs are changing mindsets and practices by demonstrating how forests can be a viable and desirable component of investments in those sectors. The programs fill analytical gaps, develop tools for integrating forests into sectoral operations, and provide evidence of what’s possible.