Provide guidance and actively encourage staff to develop and utilize sustainable forest management outcome indicators that can adequately track progress across the three pillars - including indicators that can track and mechanisms that can manage attendant tensions and tradeoffs in the forest landscape.
The monitoring and reporting systems of the World Bank forest sector operations are inadequate to verify whether its operations are supporting forest management in an environmentally and socially sustainable way, in line with the 2002 Strategy and the Bank Group's Operational Policies. Environmental indicators used in forest projects are mainly process or effort measures (such as number of hectares planted, or numbers of hectares under management plans).
Most poverty alleviation indicators were less direct indicators of poverty than is desirable both for accurately assessing project outcomes and for comparison across projects. Poverty reduction indicators like numbers of productive investments made are imperfect measures of whether programs are reaching the most vulnerable members of a community.
Several of IFC's downstream Forest Sector investments cannot be evaluated from a sustainable forest management perspective because information regarding chain-of- custody of the wood products sources is lacking.
Original Response: Agreed: More recent IFC downstream forest product sector projects that were not covered by the evaluation already track chain of custody of raw materials, ensuring our clients source from sustainably managed origins.
Action 4C: Strengthen collaboration with other development and technical agencies to build a critical mass of global knowledge on performance monitoring of forest conservation and management projects and programs.
Indicator: number of knowledge networks established
Baseline: zero
Target: one
Timeline: FY14
Management unilaterally retired this recommendation. The action step, to develop a Forest Knowledge Network, is only tangentially linked to the fulfillment of this recommendation. As stated in last year's MAR, IFC was requested to demonstrate how participation in that network is leading to changes in M&E, so that as agreed, the WBG could apply more meaningful proxy indicators to predict forest investment outcomes. IEG also requested data on chain of custody for IFC's downstream product lines in last year's MAR. No evidence to support the chain of custody references were received by IEG.
This recommendation has been marked complete by Management. IEG recognizes that substantial progress made in establishing a formal forest knowledge network and IFC's important participation in Forest related knowledge networks and international forest events. The spirit of the recommendation, however, is one of integrating this knowledge into the way the WBG monitors, measures and reports on sustainable forest management outcomes -including through the use of proxies - so that in the aggregate, we are capable of understanding how we are achieving the goals set out in the 2002 Forest Strategy. For the IFC, IEG cited missing information in downstream product lines with regard to the chain of custody. IEG would kindly request an update of the original management response with regard to chain of custody.
IEG recognizes that substantial progress made in establishing a formal forest knowledge network and IFC's important participation in Forest related knowledge networks and international forest events. The spirit of the recommendation, however, is one of integrating this knowledge into the way the WBG monitors, measures and reports on sustainable forest management outcomes -including through the use of proxies - so that in the aggregate, we are capable of understanding how we are achieving the goals set out in the 2002 Forest Strategy. For the IFC, IEG cited missing information in downstream product lines with regard to the chain of custody. IEG would kindly request an update of the original management response with regard to chain of custody.
- formal forest knowledge network with IUCN and CIFOR (Knowfor) established - active ongoing engagement within the network, Collaborative Partnership for Forests and with other partners. We have participated in several knowledge events this year including the FAO Forest Resources Advisory Group, the International Association of Impact Assessment, and the World Forestry Congress.
(note: Mark Constantine and Leopoldo Sposato have completed reviewed and cleared the update and ratings for this recommendation as a Task Leader and Reviewing Manager and have authorized Kris Luniku to clear in the system on their behalf).