The Forestry Compendium was conceived to meet the need for the improved dissemination of knowledge on forest trees. The pilot phase in Compendium development in 1994-95 resulted in a demonstration version of a PC-based multimedia system. This interactive demonstration version was produced by CABI in collaboration with the Oxford Forestry Institute (OFI; now part of the Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, UK) in a project sponsored by the Forestry Research Programme of the UK Overseas Development Administration (now the Department for International Development - DFID). In 1995 CABI conducted a comprehensive survey of user needs for a Compendium for the Asia-Pacific Region, the results indicating an urgent need for the Compendium among a wide range of user groups.
In early 1996, CIFOR was approached and agreed to join CABI in preparing a joint project proposal for dissemination to potential members of a project Development Consortium. Efforts to build the Development Consortium for the project met with some notable successes in 1996. Therefore, a project to produce the Forestry Compendium - Module 1 - began in January 1997. In early 1997, the PROSEA Foundation became a full partner in the project, later to be joined by OFI and ICRAF. A project Inception Workshop was held at CIFOR in April 1997 and the Compendium concept was demonstrated at the World Forestry Congress in Antalya, Turkey, in October 1997.
