asked Her Majesty's Government:

What progress has been made with the £50 million rainforest initiative announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget speech.[HL4293]

Practical details of the initiative are currently being worked on by DfID officials, the co-chairs of the fund and stakeholders in the Congo basin region. NGOs and officials in other HMG departments (Defra, FCO, HMT) are being kept informed of progress.

Two co-chairs, Professor Wangari Maathai, former winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and Congo Forest Goodwill Ambassador, and the right honourable Paul Martin, Canada's former Prime Minister and Finance Minister, have been selected. They will help develop a clear governance framework to ensure that the fund has strong African ownership.

Decisions on fund policies and on where and how to allocate resources will be taken by the steering board during the design phase. The steering board is likely to include the two co-chairs, as well as two DfID officials, two representatives from the Central Africa Forests Commission (COMIFAC) secretariat, environmental NGO representatives, as well as African Development Bank and World Bank representatives.

There have also been technical working sessions with the officials of the COMIFAC secretariat based in Cameroon to determine which specific components of COMIFAC's convergence plan the fund will support.

The fund is due to start operating in April 2008.