Governments are confronted with a range of economic, ecological, and political choices in achieving sustainable forest management (SFM). Countries with forest resources face three major challenges: how to avoid further deforestation; how to improve management of forest resources and avoid practices that continue to degrade forests; and how to restore forest landscapes that have been degraded. Only by addressing these challenges simultaneously can the sustainable flow of forest goods and ecosystem services be achieved.

This Annual Progress Report features key activities, milestones, and figures from 23 country projects across the planetGOLD program for the July 2022 – June 2023 reporting period.

This report documenting planetGOLD’s progress from July 2021 through June 2022 shows how project teams in planetGOLD made key advances toward helping miners go mercury-free, by improving miners’ awareness of the dangers of mercury use, educating, and demonstrating to them viable technical alternatives, and progressing in creating an enabling regulatory and financial environment that supports miners to undertake this transition.