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This edition of Unasylva comes in the wake of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, Rio+20,which, among other things, produced a document called The Future We Want. In it, world leaders renewed their commitment to sustainable development and stated that “the wide range of products and services that forests provide creates opportunities to address many of the most pressing sustainable development challenges”. Foresters should be pleased with these words because they indica te that forests are starting to get the recognition they deserve. In this edition of Unasylva we look at the power of forests to bring about sustainable development. In their overview article, Rao Matta and Laura Schweitzer Meins set out the many contributions that forests can make, such as the sustainable provision of food, energy, wood and ecosystem services. They call for a repositioning – towards the centre – of forests in sustainable development initiatives and say that stro ng global leadership is needed “to instil broad understanding about the socio-economic benefits of investing in forests”.
