Director General and Board Chair Messages
Influencing Policies and Practices
Policy development is a complex process, involving a wide range of actors, feedback loops and time lags. For greater impact, CIFOR identifies specific needs among decision-makers and tailors its research, analysis and engagement activities to meet those needs.
This year, CIFOR saw the fruits of several years of targeted research on oil palm and peatland fires in Indonesia, forest landscape restoration in Peru, and sustainable use of forests for food throughout the tropics.
A scientific reality check: CIFOR informs Peru’s plans for restoration through planted trees
Targeted analysis of Peru’s tree plantation sector proves useful to decision-makers
Peru has pledged to restore 3.2 million hectares of degraded land by 2020, and it hopes to achieve two-thirds of that goal through commercial plantations. Exactly how is the challenge.
Research for Impact
CIFOR recognizes that change doesn’t begin when scientific findings are published – it can be triggered at every step of the research pathway. Our projects are designed to bring together the actors who can make change happen, while evaluating outcomes and impacts in an evolving process of learning.
In 2017, CIFOR launched the third phase of its Comparative Global Study on REDD+ with a focus on impact assessment, studied the relationship between migration and forests in Burkina Faso, Nepal, Indonesia and Tajikistan, and examined the ways in which DFID KNOWFOR-funded projects transformed our approach to measuring – and communicating – our impact.
- Given what is at stake – the climate, forest biodiversity and the livelihoods of millions of people – we need to build the best possible evidence base for understanding the performance of different forest policies and programs. A good way to do this is through rigorous case-comparative approaches over time.
Amy Duchelle
CIFOR Senior Scientist
Research for impact
382
publications
- 10 Books
- 53 Infobriefs
- 26 Chapters
- 35 Occasional and working papers
204 Journal articles
78% in Open Access journals
78% in Open Access journals
10,162
citations (28/day)
1,479,954
downloads (4,055/day)
Visits through Google Books:
415,450
1.8% increase from 2016
Capacity Development
Co-learning is central to CIFOR’s work: among colleagues, communities, indigenous and women’s groups, government, private companies, and local and international organizations.
This year, the Global Comparative Study on Tenure Reform fueled discussions on forest resource rights through research, engagement and training across the tropics. CIFOR’s work on value chains brought together farmers and factory owners in Tanzania and Mozambique, and put mapping tools in the hands of communities.
Students are learning how to measure carbon in peat swamps, conduct surveys and analyze complex data. CIFOR scientists are training graduate students in the Democratic Republic of the Congo with support from the European Union, while Indonesian masters students are studying at US universities under the USAID-funded Forestry Fellowship Program.
Capacity development
Formal training
- 74PhD
- 137MSc/MA
- 34BSc/BA
91
Women154
MenShort-term training
1,269
Women1,386
MenOutreach and Engagement
Through targeted communications and proactive engagement with everyone from smallholders to ministers, CIFOR aims to ensure that everyone has a seat at the table – and that the debate is founded on solid scientific evidence.
2017 launched a new era for the Global Landscapes Forum, which held events in Jakarta, Indonesia and Bonn, Germany, complementing a range of other workshops and presentations by CIFOR scientists around the world. Forests News, along with CIFOR’s websites and social media, brought the science behind the conversations to life.
- If we want to master these challenges, we have to make the land use sector a focus of our efforts.
Barbara Hendricks
German Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMUB)
Outreach and engagement
51
Countries
- 63 Funding partners
- 30 Research institutes
- 108 Partners
- 52 Universities
- 114 Memoranda of understanding
- 130 Letters of agreement
100
active projects
with a strong gender focus
18
events organized or supported, with
35,705
attendees
Forestsnews
406
articles, viewed
213,783
times on Forests News
29
Analysis pieces, viewed
27,997
times on Forests News
Gender across CIFOR’s Work
- Before, I used to be known as somebody’s wife. Now people recognize me for who I am and what I do. All because of the rights I have!
Dadhikala Poudyal
member of the Chisapani Community Forest User Group, Nepal
A deep and evolving understanding of gender dynamics underlies all of CIFOR’s activities, whether as a focus of specific studies, as a consideration in all research projects, or within the organization itself. Taking a rights-based approach to gender equality, CIFOR also examines how gender intersects with ethnicity, wealth status, caste and age to influence outcomes.
In 2017, CIFOR scientists authored major publications on gender and forestry, tenure security, climate change policy, migration and forest landscape restoration, and gave voice to women around the world through videos, photo essays and feature stories.
CIFOR by the Numbers
As a scientific organization, we apply the same level of rigor to the analysis of our own performance as we do in our research. In some cases, CIFOR’s contributions and expertise are recognized through awards – which is nice. But we also like to measure our progress towards specific outreach, gender and operational benchmarks.
CIFOR’s contribution to the global policy dialogue gained more international recognition this year.
out of 100 top Climate Think Tanks
International Center for Climate Governance
(up from 5th place in 2016)
Two articles by CIFOR scientists were among the top 5 most influential articles of 2016 published in Environmental Evidence, and were in the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric
CIFOR and its partners contribute to the following global processes, frameworks, panels and conventions:
CIFOR uses key performance indicators to chart our impact through research, capacity development and engagement, and to measure our operational performance.
Citations of CIFOR publications in 2017
10,162
International web ranking as research center
cifor.org ranking among CGIAR Centers
2nd
(MozRank: 73/100)
Readership of Forests News
56,938
Views per month
Capacity development
CIFOR trainees in long- and short-term programs
1,540
1,360
Long-term financial stability
recommended range: 75-90 days
92 days
Operating funds
recommended range: 90-120 days
116 days
Audited income
for 2017 (USD)
30,604,000
Future 3-year income
confirmed through grant agreements or other means (USD)
2018
39,676,000
2019
29,311,000
2020
26,455,000
Audited indirect cost ratio
16%
Senior staff dynamics
11 in 
19 out
11 in 19 out 39%Change
17%
22%Where we work
CIFOR conducts research in over 50 countries across Asia, Africa and Latin America. Our scientists work with national, subnational and local governments as well as academia and non-governmental organizations, extending the reach of our impact from the local to the international level.
Partners, Board of Trustees and Finance
CIFOR’s work is possible thanks to the financial support of our Funding Partners and the collaboration of our Strategic Partners. We work closely with a range of local and international organizations and institutions to deliver research projects with the greatest potential impact.
About CIFOR
CIFOR is currently a member of these CGIAR Research Programs:
CIFOR advances human well-being, equity and environmental integrity by conducting innovative research, developing partners’ capacity, and actively engaging in dialogue with all stakeholders to inform policies and practices that affect forests and people. CIFOR is a CGIAR Research Center, and leads the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (FTA). Our headquarters are in Bogor, Indonesia, with offices in Nairobi, Kenya, Yaounde, Cameroon, and Lima, Peru.