Directors:
Greg Amacher Ph.D. Amacher received his Doctorate
degree in natural resource economics and Masters degrees in statistics,
forestry, and economics from the University of Michigan. Amacher has
published over 50 refereed articles in forest and natural resource
development, focusing primarily on the spillover of small landowner
decisions onto forest stocks, forest and ex-sector policies in developing
and developing country contexts, deforestation and government budgets,
rural migration, and the interaction between health and natural resource
use. He currently holds the editorship of Forest Science and serves
on the Editorial boards of Journal of Environmental Economics and
Management and Journal of Forest Economics. He has been a Visiting
Scholar at University of Gothenberg in Sweden and the University of
Helsinki. Amacher has worked on projects involving forest policy and
economics problems in Chile, The Philippines, Nepal, Pakistan, Ethiopia,
China, and Malaysia.
http://www.fw.vt.edu/forestry/faculty/amacher.html
Frank Merry Ph.D. Frank Merry received his Doctorate
degree in Forest Economics from the School of Forest Resources and
Conservation at the University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida. He
is a citizen if Trinidad and Tobago, and has worked in Trinidad, Venezuela,
Senegal, Bolivia, and Brazil. His research interests are international
timber trade, the cattle and forestry conflict, economic analysis
of small farms, and forest industry change in the Amazon. His broad
experience in international development projects and forestry research
give him a unique ability to foster cooperation between the US and
international scientists. He is currently part of the team establishing
the Instituto Floresta Tropical - a program that teaches Reduced Impact
Logging techniques to the forest industry in Brazil. In addition,
his current research is in production efficiency of sawmills in the
Brazilian Amazon.
http://www.fw.vt.edu/forestry/faculty/merry.html
Steering Committee:
The IFC program is guided by a steering committee of
five respected International Scientists and Foresters chosen from
a broad set of disciplines. The committee will meet annually with
the two Directors of the IFC. The composition of the steering committee
is subject to change every couple of years to ensure the injection
of new visions and ideas. The steering committee selection is currently
underway. The following people are currently on the committee and
the remaining positions are as yet unfilled:
- Jan Engert, Latin America Program Coordinator, USDA Forest Service
- Daniel Nepstad, Biologist and Senior Scientist, Woods Hole Research
Center
- Johan Zweede, Forester and Executive Director, Fundação
Floresta Tropical
Associated VPI faculty:
