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Yale Forest Forum Leadership Seminar Lunch Series
Thursdays at 12:00 noon
Marsh Hall Rotunda
360 Prospect Street, New Haven
Lunch Provided
Free and open to the public
Upcoming Spring '06 Speakers
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April 27, 2006
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"Community Forestry: The Indian Challenge"
Tata L Raghu Ram
Assistant Professor at the Centre for Development and Environmental Policy Group, Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, India and
Fulbright Environmental Leadership Fellow at the JF Kennedy School of Government
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Previous Speakers |
February 9, 2006 "UNFF and the Future of International Arrangements on Forests"
Ewald Rametsteiner, Head of the European Forest Institute’s (EFI) Regional Project Centre "INNOFORCE" on Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Forestry.
He holds a Diplom-Ingenieur of forest sector economics from Universität für Bodenkultur Vienna, has advanced training in Marketing und International Business Strategy from the London School of Economics, and the University of Economics Vienna and conducted doctoral studies at the Universität für Bodenkultur Vienna.
Rametsteiner has worked in forest policy and marketing since 1993 in positions that include being a member of the Austrian Technical Committee on Sustainability and the Austrian Technical Committee on the Certification Process, as Assistant Coordinator of the EU Fair Project’s “Timber Certification” at the Institute of Forest Sector Policy and Economics, Policy Advisor at the Liaison Unit of the Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe, and serving on the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe’s Team of Public Relations Specialists in the Forest and Forest Industries Sector and of Specialists on Forest Products Markets and Marketing.
He conducts research and has written or edited 5 books and numerous articles on the subjects of forest certification, marketing and forest sustainability.
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February 2, 2006
"Timber Investment Management Organizations"
Bob Saul, Head of domestic timber investment for GMO, a global investment management firm.
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| Since joining GMO in 1997 as head of the domestic timber investment program, Bob has acquired 70 properties in 17 states worth over $740 million. These acquisitions total more than 1,490,000 acres. Many of these transactions have included the development of innovative joint ventures with national conservation groups. The initial increase in appraised value of these acquisitions averages more than 15 percent.
Prior to joining GMO, Bob worked as the general manager of GRAPE Realty Trust and as President of Timber Farm Company, a business engaged in establishing hardwood plantations in New England. Bob has also managed a tree nursery, and owned a furniture manufacturing business. He is a Certified Arborist and a forester. He also has as B.A. in English from Amherst College and a M.P.P. from Harvard University.
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January 26, 2006 |
"Forest Policy, Planning and Law"
Bud Watson, Co-Director of the Model Forest Policy Program (MFPP)
Bud Watson has over twenty years experience in environmental law, planning, technical evaluation, and education. He has pursued these activities across a spectrum of private sector, government, and public interest organizations. He currently is Co-Director of the Model Forest Policy Program (MFPP), which works to develop legislation promoting sustainable forestry applicable to the Southeastern states. He is also a member of Virginia Forest Watch (VAFW), where he has worked to help pass forestry legislation in Virginia. In addition to his work with MFPP and VAFW, he maintains an environmental consulting practice in the Washington, D.C. area. His consulting practice concentrates on evaluating land development impacts on water quality and the development of effective measures to alleviate these adverse environmental impacts.
From 1990 to 2004 he conducted an environmental law practice with the Richmond, Virginia law firm of Hirschler Fleischer, P.C. From December 2000 to February 2002 he served as a forest policy consultant to the Dogwood Alliance. In 1997 and 1998 he set up the Partnership for the Delaware Estuary for EPA Regions II and III and the states of Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. He also worked for ten years on water quality issues in the Chesapeake Bay.
From 1987 to 1989, as executive director of the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Chesapeake Bay Local Assistance Department, he directed the development of nonpoint source control regulations that are binding on Virginia local governments in Tidewater Virginia. As initial director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s Virginia office and its senior attorney during the period 1980 to 1987, he worked at all levels of government to protect Bay water quality, including bringing citizen suits against major polluters and working to develop the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act. His major Clean Water Act citizen suit ended up in the U.S. Supreme Court.
He has been an adjunct lecturer on the staffs of the University of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, and George Washington University, where he taught courses in environmental law and environmental management.
Mr. Watson is a graduate of Dartmouth College, holds an M.S. degree in environmental sciences from the University of Virginia, and has a law degree from the University of Richmond.
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February 16, 2006 |
"Who Will Inherit Your Land: Your Family or the IRS?"
Kelli P. Washington, CFA
Kelli is a 2nd Year student at the Yale School of Management. Prior to enrolling at Yale SOM, Kelli worked for 10 years in the brokerage industry, having spent the most recent 3 years as a portfolio manager helping individuals to design and implement their estate plans.
Kelli holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation and has attended Cannon Financial Institutes’ Trust School
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February 23, 2006 |
"Asian Longhorn Beetle Biology and Behavior"
Melody Keena, USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station
Melody Keena has been a research entomologist with the Northeastern Research Station, Research Work Unit 4501 “Biology and Biological Control of Invasive forest Insects” located in Hamden, Connecticut since beginning her career with the Forest Service in 1992.
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The unit’s mission is to provide new information on the biology and ecology of invasive forest insects and develop biological and ecological information and technologies for their management and control.
Dr. Keena’s research focuses on developing the knowledge and tools needed for exclusion and eradication of non-native invasive forest insects specifically the Asian longhorned beetle, nun moth, and Asian gypsy moth. Her research includes studies on basic biology, behavior, inheritance of important traits, effectiveness of available biorational pesticides and developing rearing methods and artificial diets to expand research on these pests. This research on non native invasive species is possible because of the Forest Service Quarantine Laboratory located in Connecticut.
Her current work on the Asian longhorned beetle (Anoplophora glabripennis) is directed toward providing the biological basis for predicting potential dispersal, understanding the influence of mating behaviors on establishment and viability of populations, developmental phenology, timing of exclusion and eradication methodologies and attack rates in different environments. She is also collaborating on the beetle’s chemical ecology and on potential alternative methods for killing larvae in solid wood packing material.
She holds a B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. in Entomology from the University of California, Davis, CA.
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March 2, 2006 |
"Potential Plant Invasions Between Eastern Asia and North America: Experimentally Evaluating The Risks"
Dick Mack, School of Biological Sciences at Washington State University
Richard N. Mack (Ph.D, Washington State University, 1971) is a Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at Washington State University. For approximately the last 25 years his research has been largely devoted to the ecology of invasive species.
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Much of his research has dealt with the aggressive invader, Bromus tectorum (Cheatgrass or downy brome) in the Intermountain West (USA). He has also investigated plant invasions in Hawaii and the southeastern U.S. He is particularly interested in the population biology (including the immigration, demography, competitive ability, and ecological genetics) of plant invaders as well as their environmental effects. He has framed much of his research with the goal of both addressing fundamental and applied aspects of combating invasive species. He served as Chair of the Department of Botany at Washington State University, 1986-1999. He served as Chair from 1999-2001 for the National Research Council's Committee for "Predicting the Invasive Potential of Non-indigenous Plants and Plant Pests in the United States."
He has served on editorial boards of Ecology & Ecological Monographs, Oecologia,
Ecological Applications and Biological Invasions. Until recently he served on the SCOPE
(Scientific Committee for Problems in the Environment) Executive Committee, and a member of the Board for
the Global Invasive Species Programme (GISP). He is currently a member of the IUCN (International Union
for the Conservation of Nature) specialist group on invasive species.
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March 23, 2006 |
"Marketing Carbon Sequestration: Where Are We?"
Neil Sampson, President of The Sampson Group, Inc, and Vision Forestry, LLC.
Neil Sampson is President of The Sampson Group, Inc. and President of Vision Forestry, LLC, a consulting firm that specializes in sustainable forest planning and forest land management. He holds the rank of Affiliate Professor in the Department of Forest Resources at the University of Idaho, and Research Associate with the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, where he is involved in research projects relating to private forest management and sustainable forestry. |
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As executive vice president of American Forests from 1984 to 1995, he launched the internationally-renowned Global ReLeaf program and the Forest Policy Center. He chaired the National Commission on Wildfire Disasters (1992-94), and served on the Technical Advisory Committee to the Edison Electric Institutes Utility Forest Carbon Management Program, the American Forest & Paper Association's External Review Panel to the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), and the Advisory Panel to The Nature Conservancy's International Carbon Mitigation Program. He is currently the Technical Consultant to the National Carbon Offset Coalition and Executive Secretary of the External Review Panel.
Sampson is a 1960 graduate of the University of Idaho, where he received his B.S. degree in Agriculture (Crops and Soils). He earned a Master's in Public Administration from Harvard University in 1974. He has authored two books on soil conservation, edited several books on natural resource topics, and published over 100 scientific and popular articles on natural resources. Recent books include Public Programs for Private Forests (1997), Forest Health in the United States (1998), and Mapping Wildfire Hazards and Risks (2000).
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March 30, 2006
"Non-Forest Timber Products in South American Tropical Forests"
Charles Peters, New York Botanical Garden
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Chuck Peter's research focuses on the regeneration, growth, and
productivity of wild plants in tropical forests. He has worked in two of the
largest, and least explored, tropical forest regions in the world -- Amazonia and Borneo.
He spent three years in the lowland forests of Peru collecting and documenting the distribution,
fruiting phenology, and use of over 100 different forest fruit trees, observing that many valuable
fruit species occur naturally in almost monospecific stands. Detailed ecological analysis revealed that
the density and productivity of these plant communities are superior to those of many plantations.
An additional study conducted in Peru assessed the economic value of the plant resources growing in a
small tract of species-rich forest. The results from this study, done in collaboration with botanists
and economists, showed that sustainable forest exploitation could actually yield higher net revenues
than more destructive forms of land-use such as logging or conversion to cattle pastures.
Since 1990, he has been conducting ecological studies on the native fruits and oilseeds of Borneo. Current research focuses on the development of sustainable management plans for a 130,000 hectare community forest reserve in West Kalimantan, Indonesia.
Chuck holds a Ph.D. from Yale University.
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April 6, 2006 |
"Balancing Business and Nature"
Andreas Eke, Director and Founder of Futuro Forestal
Futuro Forestal is a German-Panamanian forest service company which over the last few years has developed an innovative model of sustainable forest management in the tropics. Futuro Forestal offers its world-wide investors a unique opportunity to own a forest, enjoy an attractive cash flow and support an ecologically and socially sustainable project. Up until now, fine tropical timber was available only from tropical forests or from mono-cultures.
The Futuro Forestal model is founded on combining biodiversity with high productivity. Futuro Forestal’s forest plantations are not common plantations, but mixed forests similar to those found in Europe. In addition to providing a means of effective wood production, these forests host a variety of indigenous animal and plant species, protect and enrich the soil, save and filter water, and contribute to a positive influence on the global climate. |
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April 13, 2006
"Feedbacks to the Climate System from New England Forests"
Jerry Mellilo
Co-Director, Senior Scientist, the Ecosystems Center at the Marine Biological Center |
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| Jerry Mellilo is interested in how human activities are altering the biogeochemistry of terrestrial ecosystems. His research includes studies of carbon and nitrogen cycling in a range of ecosystems across the globe including arctic shrublands in northern Sweden, temperate forests in North America, and tropical forests and pastures in the Amazon Basin of Brazil. He has become increasingly committed to studying the large-scale effects of global change on terrestrial ecosystems, including effects on the chemistry of the atmosphere and on the climate system. He uses a combination of field experiments and simulation modeling. Together with a number of collaborators, he is presently conducting soil warming experiments at the Harvard Forest in western Massachusetts and at the Abisko Research Station in Sweden to study the effects of warming on soil carbon and nitrogen dynamics, plant growth, and potential feedbacks to the climate system. |
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