Forest Leadership Forum 2002

In April 2002, Metafore (then the Certified Forest Products Council) partnered with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to host the 2002 Forest Leadership Forum in Atlanta, Georgia.

The forum was a unique and ground-breaking venue for uniting environmental groups, retailers and the forest products industry based on common values surrounding responsible forest products trade. Responsible for bringing together more than 1,300 participants from 45 countries, the forum was widely recognized as a landmark event.

It established a new collaborative framework for solving issues of common concern, such as illegal logging and high conservation-value forests, and the role of certification schemes in improving forest management.

Stakeholders previously thought of as adversaries used this forum to openly address the key challenges and opportunities facing business, social and environmental entities in the 21st century.

The forum was an unprecedented convergence of ideas. It underscored Metafore’s fundamental belief that we stand to gain far more as a society by collectively working to address common challenges than we do by squabbling over our differences.