26 March 2013: The National Forest Programme Facility of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) has released a training manual titled, “Collaborative Conflict Management for Enhanced National Forest Programmes,” which offers guidelines for creating and running training courses for practitioners managing forest policy related conflict.

The manual outlines a number of steps for effective training including: identifying the participants; assessing the participants’ needs; setting the training objectives; preparing the training agenda; and following-up on the plan. The training manual suggests plans of procedure based on: an introduction to training and conflict; ways of managing conflict; an introduction to consensual negotiation and mediation; and building negotiation and mediation skills.

Finally the training manual offers sample case studies, methodologies for rapid daily feedback and detailed plans for daily sessions. [Publication: Collaborative Conflict Management for Enhanced National Forest Programmes]