The
FOREST EUROPE process (
Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe, MCPFE) was started by Strasbourg Conference in 1990 and the Forest Principles were adopted and incorporated into the agenda by Helsinki Conference in 1993. The process covers Pan-European region consisting of 47 signatories (46 European countries and the European Union) that partially overlaps with
Montréal Process region (Russia is a signatory of both processes). As a result of lobbying by the developing country caucus (or
Group of 77) in the
United Nations, the non-legally binding Forest Principles were established in 1992. These linked the problem of
deforestation to
third world debt and inadequate
technology transfer and stated that the "agreed full incremental cost of achieving benefits associated with forest conservation...should be equitably shared by the international community" (para1(b)). Subsequently, the
Group of 77 argued in the 1995
Intergovernmental Panel on Forests (IPF) and then the 2001
Intergovernmental Forum on Forests (IFF), for affordable access to environmentally sound technologies without the stringency of
intellectual property rights; while developed states there rejected demands for a forests fund. The expert group created under the
United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF) reported in 2004, but in 2007 developed nations again vetoed language in the principles of the final text which might confirm their legal responsibility under international law to supply finance and environmentally sound technologies to the developing world. The
Montréal Process, also known as the
Working Group on Criteria and Indicators for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Temperate and Boreal Forests, was started in 1994 as a result of the Forest Principles. == See also ==