Locations
EU4Forests
EU4Forests
UNDP Albania
Background
Albania's forests are a vital national asset, covering approximately 46 percent of the country's territory, or around 1.3 million hectares. They provide essential ecosystem services by conserving biodiversity, supporting rural livelihoods, regulating the climate, protecting water resources, and reducing the risks of floods, erosion, and other natural hazards.
Despite their importance, Albania's forests have experienced decades of degradation driven by unsustainable management practices, overexploitation, ageing forest stands, illegal logging, forest fires, and insufficient investment. These pressures have contributed to a significant decline in forest resources, weakened ecosystem resilience, and reduced the sector's ability to contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable rural development.
The forestry sector also faces important governance and institutional challenges. While the decentralization of forest management responsibilities has created opportunities for community-based management, it has also exposed significant capacity gaps at the local level. Limited institutional capacities, fragmented governance arrangements, and outdated management systems continue to constrain effective planning, monitoring, enforcement, and the implementation of sustainable forest management practices.
Funded by the European Union and implemented by the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) and UNDP, the EU4Forests project supports the Government of Albania in advancing sustainable forest management and strengthening alignment with EU environmental and climate standards.
With a total budget of EUR 13 million, EU4Forests will strengthen forest governance, enhance institutional capacities, modernize forest information and monitoring systems, and support alignment of the forestry sector with EU standards. Over five years, the project will support the preparation of 10 municipal forest management plans and a national afforestation and reforestation plan, while promoting ecosystem restoration, forest fire prevention, and the modernization of the Albania Forest Information System. It will also introduce a municipal grant scheme to encourage sustainable local forest management and implement awareness-raising activities to foster community engagement and behavioural change. Building on previous investments and complementing initiatives such as EU for Nature and IPARD, the project promotes a coordinated, long-term approach to sustainable forest management that delivers environmental, economic, and social benefits for present and future generations.
Implementation will be carried out in close partnership with the Ministry of Environment, the National Forestry Agency, municipalities, and other relevant public institutions, while actively engaging local communities, the private sector—particularly SMEs in the wood-processing industry—academia, and civil society. Through participatory approaches, public–private partnerships, and innovative solutions such as GIS-based forest monitoring and AI-supported wildfire risk assessment, EU4Forests will help build a more resilient, sustainable, and inclusive forestry sector in Albania. Gender equality, human rights, climate resilience, and disaster risk reduction will be mainstreamed across all project interventions.
EU4Forests contributes to the implementation of Albania's Policy Document for Forests 2019–2030, the National Strategy for Development and European Integration, and other national priorities, while supporting the EU Green Agenda for the Western Balkans and the EU Forest Strategy for 2030.
The launch event of the EU4Forests project
Summary
The EU4Forests project aims to strengthen Albania's forestry sector by improving forest governance, aligning the national legal and institutional framework with the EU acquis, and enhancing the country's contribution to climate change mitigation through sustainable forest management, afforestation, and increased carbon sequestration. The project supports Albania's EU integration process while promoting resilient forest ecosystems, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable rural development.
To achieve these objectives, the project is structured around seven components. The first component focuses on creating an enabling legal, institutional, and governance framework for sustainable forest management. It will support the alignment of forestry legislation with the EU acquis, strengthen forest governance, and enhance institutional capacities at both national and local levels to ensure effective implementation and enforcement.
The second component focuses on strengthening the administrative and technical capacities required for sustainable forest management. It will support institutional assessments, capacity development programmes, improved operational procedures, and enhanced systems for forest data collection, monitoring, and reporting. The third component complements these efforts by improving the accounting of greenhouse gas emissions and removals from forests in line with the EU LULUCF acquis. It will modernize the Albania Forest Information System (ALFIS) through the introduction of GIS-based monitoring, digital data management, and AI-supported wildfire risk assessment, enabling more accurate forest inventories, monitoring, and reporting.
The fourth and fifth components focus on strengthening sustainable forest management through strategic planning and on-the-ground investments. The project will support the preparation of ten Municipal Forest Management Plans and a National Afforestation and Reforestation Plan to guide long-term forest restoration and sustainable management. Building on these plans, priority interventions will be implemented to restore degraded forest areas, expand afforestation and reforestation, strengthen forest nurseries, improve forest fire prevention, equip forest services, and enhance the technical capacity required for sustainable forest management.
The sixth component promotes local implementation of sustainable forest management through a municipal grant scheme that will support innovative actions for forest restoration, fire and erosion prevention, and community-based forest management. The project will also promote sustainable forest value chains by encouraging public-private partnerships, particularly with small and medium-sized enterprises in the wood-processing sector, while fostering collaboration with municipalities, academia, civil society, and local communities.
To ensure that these interventions generate long-term impact and broad stakeholder ownership, the seventh component focuses on public awareness, stakeholder engagement, and behavioural change. National and local awareness campaigns will promote sustainable forest management, biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation, and wildfire prevention. Gender equality, human rights, social inclusion, climate resilience, and disaster risk reduction will be mainstreamed across all project activities, ensuring that forest management contributes to resilient communities and sustainable economic development.
The project will be implemented nationwide, supporting national institutions responsible for forest governance while prioritizing interventions in selected municipalities through forest management planning, afforestation and restoration activities, grant schemes, and capacity development. The knowledge, tools, and good practices developed under the project will contribute to strengthening Albania's forestry sector and supporting the country's transition towards sustainable, climate-resilient forest management in line with EU standards.
Outcomes and Outputs
PROJECT OBJECTIVE: Improvement of the quality of environmental protection and contribution to actions and policies against climate change to accelerate the shift towards a low-carbon economy.
OUTCOME 1 - Improvement of the administrative capacities and alignment of the legal framework of the forestry sector in Albania with the EU acquis.
Output 1: EU Forestry acquis aligned, and other legislation prepared
• Assessment of the current level of transposition and implementation of the EU forestry legislation and policies
• Develop primary and secondary legislation to fully transpose EU forestry legislation and policy
• Preparation of EUDR, FLEGT and LULCF Implementation Plan
Output 2: Administrative capacity and capabilities for Sustainable Forest Management and data collection and reporting improved
• Assessment of the administrative and technical capacity of national and local authorities for SFM
• Developing of Training plan and Strategy with Action plan for strengthening administrative capacity at national and local level for SFM
• Preparation of a Technical specification of needed equipment and tool for SFM
• Deliver training for SFM to competent authorities and relevant stakeholders
Output 4: related to Outcome 1 and 2: Forestry management plans prepared and their implementation supported
• Preparation of 10 forest municipal management plans
• Preparation of National forestation/reforestation plan
• Develop a List of priority measures for implementation of the forest management plans with implementation plans
Output 6: Grant scheme for implementing sustainable forest management measures including forest fire and erosion prevention implemented
• Preparation, evaluation and monitoring of Guidance for Grant application for implementing forest management activities
• Implementing forestation/reforestation of areas managed by municipalities through grant scheme
• Implementing activities for preventing forest fires through grant scheme
OUTCOME 2 - Increase the forest coverage and the carbon sink capacities for Albania.
Output 3: Accounting emissions process and removals from the forests in line with the LULUCF and related acquis supported
• Preparation of Protocol for the monitoring and reporting of forest data
• Supporting the process of accounting of emissions and removal in the forestry sector
• Support for the reporting from municipalities and other institutions for the forestry required data
Output 5: Forestation/reforestation of priority forest areas and improving management practices and technical capacity for SFM implemented
• Implementation of specific priority measures included in the forest management plans
• Purchasing equipment for SFM
• Preparation of central forest nursing facility within NFA
• Establishing central forest nursing facility within NFA
Output 7: related to Outcome 1 and 2: Public awareness campaigns targeting the local communities for sustainable forest management implemented
• Implementation of public awareness campaigns to promote sustainable forest management.
