Recently completed studies

Ex post impact assessments

• Raitzer, D.A. 2008. Assessing the Impact of CIFOR’s Influence on Policy and Practice in the Indonesian Pulp and Paper Sector. Impact Assessment Paper. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  Qualitative and quantitative methods are applied to assess the impact of CIFOR’s political economy research on the Indonesian pulp and paper sector. Key-informant interviews triangulated by trend-series tests suggest important influence through advocacy intermediaries and counterfactuals of slower adoption of improvements. Effects on conservation set-asides, overcapacity and plantation establishment are estimated to avert loss of 76,000 to 212,000 hectares of natural forest (135,000 under main assumptions). Application of an economic-surplus framework for environmental benefits of forest conservation and avoided implicit wood subsidies finds benefits of $US19 to $583 million (US$133 million main estimate), compared with US$500,000 of direct research costs

Ex post studies of influence

• CIFOR, 2005. Achievements of the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) 1998-2005. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  The study is a relatively comprehensive inventory of perceived examples of CIFOR use and uptake of CIFOR research products produced between 1998 and 2005. Based on interaction with senior scientific staff, the study identifies national policy changes, international policy processes, development agency policies, and community initiatives that have been influenced by CIFOR work. As a result, the study is a useful basis for the selection of case studies for impact assessment.

• Spilsbury, M.J. 2005. The sustainability of forest management: assessing the impact of CIFOR criteria and indicators research. Impact Assessment Papers no. 4. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  The study attributes influence on forest management practices to the use of CIFOR research on Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management. In so doing, the study assesses a broad range of impact pathways, including forest certification requirements and various national regulations. In total, the study finds that the management of 5 million hectares of forest was substantively influenced by this research, and that many more millions of hectares were slightly influenced.

Citation studies

CIFOR has conducted a number of diffusion studies, so as to capture global uptake of research results.  Due to the number of uptake pathways captured, these do not go beyond use to establish counterfactual scenarios of events.

• Angelsen, A. and B. Aryal. 2005. Contributing to the scientific literature - Citation of CIFOR publications. Impact Assessment Papers no. 6. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  The study quantifies total number of CIFOR publications, investigates citation rates, and identifies characteristics of most frequently cited papers.

• Spilsbury, M.J. and P. Bose. 2005. Influencing the global forest policy agenda – an evaluation of CIFOR research. Impact Assessment Papers no. 2. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  This study identifies CIFOR’s contributions to the international forest agenda through bibliometric analysis of 193 key international forest policy papers. In so doing, the report identifies important uptake of CIFOR findings in key documents of the World Bank, FAO and the Convention on Biological Diversity.

• Spilsbury, M.J. and N. Haase. 2005. An evaluation of POLEX (CIFORs Forest Policy Experts Listserv). Impact Assessment Papers no. 3. Bogor, Indonesia: CIFOR.
  Reports the results of a survey of recipients of POLEX email messages, so as to estimate total readership, use of message content, and identify areas for potential improvement.

Related papers

• Spilsbury, M.J.; Kaimowitz, D. 2000. The influence of research and publications on conventional wisdom and policies affecting forests. Unasylva 51(203): 3-10.

• Spilsbury, M.J.; Kaimowitz, D. 2002. Forestry research, innovation and impact in developing countries - from economic efficiency to the broader public good. Forestry Chronicle 78(1): 103-107

• Spilsbury, M.J. 2002. Getting forestry research into policy and practice. Proceedings of the IUFRO Task Force on the Science/Policy Interface International Workshop on Forest Science and Forest Policy in the Asia-Pacific Region: Building Bridges to a Sustainable Future, held in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, on 16-19 July 2002.

• Spilsbury, M.J.; Nasi, R. 2006. The interface of policy research and the policy development process: challenges posed to the forestry community. Forest Policy and Economics 8: 193– 205.