Athens, Ga. – Bob Izlar, director of the University of Georgia Center for Forest Business, recently won the Society of American Foresters’ Sir William Schlich Memorial Award. He was recognized during a ceremony at the 2012 SAF National Convention on Oct. 25 in Spokane, Wash.
The Schlich Award, which honors the founder of British forestry, recognizes broad and outstanding contributions to the field of forestry with emphasis on policy and national or international activities. It was first awarded to President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935. Since then, it has only been given 34 times.
“I am very blessed to have been honored by the SAF for doing what I enjoy,” Izlar said. “It makes me very proud to be a Georgia Bulldog with such wonderful support from my family, colleagues, students and friends.”
As director of the Center for Forest Business, which is based in the UGA Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, Izlar oversees the agency’s mission of providing national leadership in education, research and service to the forest industry, private landowners and the state.
Izlar has spent more than 40 years in the field of forestry and has been professionally involved with more than 20 forestry and natural resources organizations. His policy work and extension activities with family-forest landowners, particularly in regard to taxation and compensation for ecological services, has led to Georgia’s adoption of conservation use valuation assessments for forest landowners. These assessments have resulted in reduced taxation on private lands that have been shown to benefit water quality and wildlife.
In addition to his work in the U.S., Izlar has traveled extensively to speak on matters of forest policy throughout the U.S. and in 37 countries in Europe, Central America, South America, Asia and the South Pacific. He discusses issues such as natural resource management policy, timberland investments and competitive business practices in the global marketplace. He also organizes international conferences on pioneering academic research and sound financial methods to educate those in the forestry industry throughout the world.
Izlar has worked with the Croatian Forest Service on market development of its forest resources and served two tours with the NATO Partnership for Peace Program in the Republic of Georgia, leading an effort to inventory forest resources and enhance their management. Since 1980, he has worked with forest landowners in Sweden and Finland on economic, supply chain, bioenergy and certification issues. In 2010, he was recognized for his contributions to international forest policy by being named a Fellow of the Swedish Royal Academy of Agriculture and Forestry.
The Society of American Foresters is the largest professional society for foresters in the world and is the national scientific and educational organization representing the forestry profession in the U.S. For more information, see http://www.safnet.org/.
For more information on the UGA Center for Forest Business, see http://www.ugacfb.com/.
