Dates: Washington DC, USA, 18th-19 th April 2007.In an era of globalisation for forest industry, challenges to sustaining the world's forests and the role of forest managers in making sound policy choices for forest research is of increasing importance. Join IUFRO president Don Lee and colleagues, Peter Mayer, Niels Elers Koch,… and others at an exciting conference for all those responsible for science development and management The goals of this conference, initiated by IUFRO unit 6/06, are to gather scientists and decision makers for managing forest research, including directors and deans of forest research institutes, universities and other related institutions in order to exchange views, share experiences and thus contribute to further improvement of forest research management globally. Confirmed speakers include: Abigail Kimbell, US Forest Service; Frances Seymour, CIFOR; Carlos Rodriguez, International Conservation; Lori Perine and invited speakers include Robert Watson, WB, and Wolfgang Pfarl, FTP.

Following the plenary session on the first day, there will be three parallel sessions. Presenters for the parallel sessions as well as the poster sessions will be chosen by a scientific panel from papers submitted representing ideas, experiences and results in one of the three parallel topics listed below. The presentations will serve as input for the working groups that will occur on the 2nd day of the conference and the poster session will be part of the evening activities of the 1st day.

Topics of the parallel sessions are:

"Setting the agenda".

Participants should present papers or posters on how to develop forest research strategies and how to prioritise research objectives in the field of applied and basic forest science. Scientists and research managers should include how to integrate the most important research topics of forestry in different parts of the world into research agendas.

"Funding and financing "

Participants should present papers or posters depicting various funding schemes for forest research institutions (research stations as well as universities). Include in the presentation strategies to acquire research funding for forest research topics and how to deal with the decline of forest research budgets all over the world. Case studies that describe success in leveraging funds and resources are of interest.

"Ensuring quality and efficiency "

Participants should present papers or posters in this session that deals with ensuring quality and efficiency of forest research. Papers and posters should address the question of performance and quality measurement of forest research institutions beyond peer reviewed papers and impact factors in order to evaluate the fulfilment of the multiple tasks of forest research institutions.

Potential participants should submit a 1-page abstract (max. 2500 characters) assigned to one of the three topics by 17th of February 2007 to Pia.Mattmueller@forst.bwl.de and indicate whether they wish to present a paper or a poster. Abstracts will be reviewed by a scientific board. Notification of acceptance or rejection of abstracts will be sent out by 21th of February 2007.

The detailed program of the conference including a registration form will be available via www. by 26 January 2007.

There will be up to 15 scholarships available for participants of the conference covering the cost of travel and accommodation and registration fees. Criteria for the selection process include gender aspects as well as the age of the applicants, regional balance and IUFRO membership. Applications for scholarships should be directed to sdehart@fs.fed.us.

A survey related to the conference is also being conducted. The questionnaire for the survey is available at http://www.iufro.org/index.php?id=3705 or http://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-6/60000/60600/links/. Participants who intend to attend the conference are kindly asked to fill in the questionnaire.

Konstantin von Teuffel,  Coordinator IUFRO Unit 6/06, (Conference co-sponsor)

Ann M. Bartuska, Deputy Chief for R&D, US Forest Service (Conference co-sponsor)