FABI Presents a World Café Session on Forest Health at the World Forestry Congress in Durban
As with many inter-disciplinary and wide-encompassing congresses like the 14th World Forestry Congress, there were many break-away sessions to home in on subject-specific forestry crises. Moderated by Dr Crous, the panelists of this session were left to freely comment on the topic: Is one tree worth the forest? The panelists consisted of the following people, and it was a privilege to have them join this most important discussion: Prof. Dr Brett Hurley (Forest Entomologist, FABI) Dr Clement Chilima (Director of Forestry, Government of Malawi) Roger Coppock (Head of Analysts, Forestry Commission, UK) Rory Mack (Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry: KwaZulu-Natal Division) Philip Ivey (South African National Biodiversity Institute, Cape Town) Joey Hulbert (PhD candidate, Forest Pathology, FABI) This topic was chosen to help us re-assess how to deal with the massive increase in forest invasive pests due to the import and export of live plants. Some key discussion points raised were that there needs to be more investment in human infrastructure (forest researchers) and physical infrastructure (quarantine facilities) to ensure that developing nations can also more rapidly and accurately detect new invasions. The dialogue session was a success, with the only draw-back being the 90 minute allotted time we were given to have this session – many things were left unsaid.