On May 17, 2011, Prof. LIU Shirong, Vice President of CAF held a talk with visiting Executive Director Emanuel Ze Meka of International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO). They reviewed the fruitful and friendly partnership between CAF and ITTO for over two decades and held discussion on potential fields and patterns of the future cooperation.

China joined the 1983 International Tropical Timber Agreement (ITTA) in 1986 and CAF started the collaboration with ITTO with a project on wood uses in 1989. So far, CAF has implemented nearly 30 ITTO projects, involving 7 affiliated institutes and centers and covering classified management of tropical forests, identification of wood properties, wood utilization and processing, management of tropical forest resources and etc. In addition, more than 20 young scientists were granted ITTO fellowship for their studies, which has helped CAF enhance its capacity building.

Mr. Ze Meka presented a full acknowledgement on the collaboration with CAF and introduced the five thematic programmes which were started in 2008.

Prof. ZHANG Shougong, President of CAF, also met Mr. Ze Meka and exchanged views on the future cooperation. Prof. JU Hongbo, Prof. YE Kelin, and Mr. CHEN Shaozhi, Directors respectively of Research Institute of Forest Resource Information Techniques, Research Institute of Wood Industry, and Research Institute of Forestry Policy and Information, also attended the meeting.