The Reforestation Value Chain for the Philippines - Smallholder Tree Growing for Rural Development and Environmental Services - page 191

assist in technology development as well as in local institution building. In the
Philippines, the use of Natural Vegetative Strips (NVS) was developed by farmers
and ICRAF scientists to help reduce soil erosion (Garrity 1995). In local institution
building, ICRAF pioneered the use of the Landcare approach in community-based
natural resources management (Mercado et al. 2000).
Of course, the ReV Chain approach does not mean that all the components should be
present in ALL reforestation projects. For example, a carbon sequestration project may
not have harvesting and processing components. Each specific project should prepare its
own ReV Chain. In addition, the generic ReV Chain presented here could be modified
in terms of its key components depending on the specific project situation.

9.4 Reforestation Value Chain Analysis: Examples

In this section a couple of hypothetical examples are presented to show how ReV
Chain can be used in a reforestation project. A typical tree planting project may
have the value chain analysis shown in Table 9.2 while a carbon sequestration
project may have a value chain analysis shown in Table 9.3. The main difference
between these two examples is that the former project allows for harvesting of trees
while the former may not. These examples show how ReV Chain can be used to
identify the essential stakeholders and their roles in the whole reforestation process
from the very beginning rather than as afterthought. Absence of any key stake-
holder will generally mean failure of the reforestation project. In addition, the ReV
Chain analysis could show the key inputs required and their cost.
Through the ReV Chain, reforestation project managers are forced to plan ahead
and anticipate the factors necessary for the success of the project. Moreover, the
weaknesses of existing reforestation projects can also be identified. Remedial
measures can then be developed to address these weaknesses. For example, if the
first case above is already an existing reforestation project, it could be that ReV
Chain analysis will reveal that the markets for products are still uncertain. In such
a case, efforts will be made to find markets for the expected tree products.

9.5 Conclusions

With millions of hectares of degraded uplands, reforestation will continue to be a
critical part in the Philippines environmental agenda. However, current efforts are
beset by short-sighted planning and implementation. ReV Chain provides an ana-
lytical and planning tool that could help reforestation projects be more holistic and
sustainable.
The use of ReV Chain has several practical implications. First, reforestation efforts
that address only part of the chain are likely to be unsustainable. In other words, each
relevant component of the value chain should be well thought of from the outset of a