Environmental conservation is intimately tied to both economic development and sustainable management of natural resources. Convergence and complementarity of environmental and developmental functions of forest management and their sustainable utilisation is a challenge for both developing and industrialised countries. Nationally forests are seen as a consumable commodity but at an international level forests are scarce resources and their non-commodity values matters particularly with respect to climate change mitigation and bio-diversity conservation. In this regard this paper reviews two aspects: an assessment of influence of non-forest sector (external) policies on forests; the initiatives taken by international community for forestry development in developing countries.