A line-up of international speakers will participate in the Global Vision 2006 conference to be held as part of the FI2006 Forest Industries exhibition in Rotorua in New Zealand next March.

The conference is being organised by INWOOD magazine which is billing the event as “a mind changing experience”. Publisher Tony Neilson said the aim was to change the way key forest industry players in New Zealand and Australia thought about their businesses and about pan-industry issues.

Speakers will include Charles Trevor, managing director of wood. for good. Mr Neilson said that while some countries were modelling wood promotion programmes on the UK initiative, interest in New Zealand had never been translated into action. He expected progress to be made as industry groups and sponsors would be able to meet key speakers after the conference.

Another speaker will be Filip de Jaegar, secretary-general of CEI-Bois, who will talk about his organisation’s Roadmap 2010 campaign to promote the use of wood.

The Canadian forest industry will describe how it is building a major power base for Canadian wood in China and how the logging community on coastal BC had adapted to lead the industry forward.