Horst Freiberg

Horst is widely recognized as a global expert on forest restoration, forest education, and biodiversity conservation and, among many achievements, is credited for inspiring the Bonn Challenge. Horst began his career in Latin America working for the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GiZ/GTZ) in Paraguay and Guatemala in Forest Education and Land use projects where he also started his first forest restoration activities with his students. From 1990-1992 he was the responsible desk officer (Fachplaner) at GiZ Headquarter for GiZ forest projects in Latin America including the Caribbean. From 1993-1995 he established as the responsible Coordinator the European Tropical Forest Research Network (ETFRN) on behalf of the European Commission Directorate XII/Research. From 1995-2008 Horst designed and developed the German Clearing-House Mechanism (CHM) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). As Member of the German Delegation to the CBD he was the responsible negotiator on the CHM, Technology Transfer and CEPA (Communication, Education and Public Awareness). In 2009 Horst joined the German Federal Ministry for the Environment (BMUV) in Bonn as Head of the newly created Division on "Forest Conservation and Sustainable Management of Forests, Biological Diversity and Climate Change". In this capacity he initiated and developed for the German Government the „Bonn Challenge“ enabling a global restoration movement. He spent a decade on Germany’s negotiating team at successive UNFCCC Conference of Parties. Horst has a B.S. in Forestry Science from Ludwig-Maximilians-University; in 1984 obtained his Dr. rer. silv. based on on successional patterns of vegetation development on volcanoes in Southern Chile.