Insights into Rwanda’s Prized Forest Policy.

In 2011, the World Future Council awarded Rwanda’s National Forest Policy with the Future Policy Award. With this award, we want to draw attention to good policies and encourage other countries to introduce comparable measures.

Not only did Rwanda manage to halt deforestation, it succeeded in reversing the trend. Since 1990 the proportion of forested area has increased by 37 per cent. The primary reasons for this trend are massive reforestation projects and plantation in cooperation with the local population. The celebrated policy also includes the clever combination of agriculture and forestry, sustainable resource management, and new education opportunities focusing on forests.

In this book we give an account of Rwanda’s prize-winning forest policy and tell of our travels across the Land of a Thousand Hills. This is a story of world records, brave people, rare animals and good solutions for the challenges of our time.