28 October 2009
Maputo — The Mozambican and Brazilian governments signed an agreement on Tuesday for the rehabilitation of the Machipanda Forestry Centre (CEFLOMA) in the central province of Manica.
Budgeted at two million US dollars, the programme will be implemented over three years. It envisages the acquisition of equipment, the installation of a plant nursery with the capacity of 100,000 saplings a year, and the construction of a new sawmill.
The agreement was signed by Mozambican Education Minister Aires Ali and Brazilian ambassador Antonio de Sousa e Silva,
Implementation of the Forestry Centre will involve the Education Ministry and the country's oldest University, the Eduardo Mondlane University (UEM). Their partners on the Brazilian side are the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC), and the Federal University of Parana.
Sousa e Silva told the ceremony that the first phase of the project, budgeted at 800,000 dollars, is intended to turn CEFLOMA into a reference centre for forestry management. The initiative, he said, will make it possible to plant two million hectares of forest in the next 16 years.
Cooperation between Mozambique and Brazil in forestry dates back to 1981. It was during an exchange of visits in 2008 between UEM and Parana University staff that CEFLOMA was identified as an important experimental unit for the UEM course on Forestry Engineering and Agronomy, and for the practical training of both Brazilian and Mozambican forestry staff.
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