Building on the initially success of the Fire-Free Village Programme, APRIL Group organised a technical workshop for the sharing of implementation and practices that have seen significant reduction in fires in Riau over the last 2 years.

The workshop opened with speakers stressing the importance of ground-up fire prevention. They included United States Ambassador to Indonesia Robert Blake, the Indonesian President’s Special Envoy for Climate Change Prof (Hon) Rachmat Witoelar, Deputy of Food and Agriculture of the Coordinating Ministry of Economic Affairs Musdalifah Mahmud, Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) scientist Dr Herry Purnomo, CIFOR post-doctorate fellow Dr Rachel Carmenta and Carbon Conversation’s Dorjee Sun.

Representatives with villages that participated in the Fire-Free Village Programme of 2015, as well as staff from APRIL Group, were also on hand to facilitate the knowledge sharing session.

The technical workshop is part of larger plans to scale up the Fire-Free Village Programme to include wider implementation, more stakeholders and a stronger collaboration between them.

More at Inside RGE.