EC Statement on Illegal Logging at Asia Forest Partnership Meeting

Tokyo, 11th November 2002

The EU's commitment to action on Forest Law Enforcement and Governance and related trade was underlined at a side event on this issue hosted by Commissioner Nielson, Commissioner for Development, at WSSD, together with the Danish Presidency of the EU.

This is an issue that is arousing considerable interest in Europe amongst the public and amongst Members of Parliament in national Parliaments and the European Parliament. Many members of the public find it hard to understand that currently there is no legal means - other than for CITES species - to prevent illegal timber entering the European Union, even if we were to be officially informed of such a shipment by the exporting country.

The European Commission is therefore drafting an Action Plan on Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade, which will constitute a starting point for action rather than a blueprint. Amongst the elements being considered are:

• Support to developing countries to strengthen forest law enforcement, and, as mentioned earlier by Dr Kaimowitz, to help countries review and revise their legislation where necessary.
• Actions to reduce the demand from the EU for illegal timber, such as through voluntary agreements with interested countries to only allow the entry into our market for legal timber from these countries.
• Other actions such as on public procurement; the role of financing institutions; the possible use of domestic criminal law, such as money-laundering legislation.

Within the region the European Commission has a large (90 M EUR) forest sector development co-operation programme in Indonesia. Our Country Strategy Paper for Indonesia for the period 2002-2006 has two main themes; support to Good Governance and Decentralisation and Sustainable Management of Natural Resources, in particular forests. There is therefore considerable scope for addressing forest law enforcement and governance in the coming years. Two million EUR have been committed for an Illegal Logging Response Centre at the Ministry of Forestry and a project identification mission for a larger project on forest law enforcement and governance is currently in the country.

Illegal logging could potentially also be addressed in other EC country programmes in South-East Asia, under the headings of trade development or good governance.

We see the Asia Forest Partnership as an important means of engaging in a dialogue on ways to tackle illegal logging, building on the Declaration of the 2001 Forest Law and Governance East Asia Ministerial Conference. Given that the EU Action Plan is still under development I am particularly interested in hearing views on this topic from both developed and developing countries present. There is therefore strong political support in the EU for action to be taken on forest law enforcement and governance, including measures to eliminate imports of illegal timber. Resources will be available to support FLEGT in Indonesia and possibly in other countries in the region.

This is a complex problem requiring collaboration between many sectors within timber consuming and also within timber-producing countries. Such collaboration requires high-level political commitment to ensure that the different Ministries and disciplines work together, including action beyond the forest sector. We hope that the Asia Forest Partnership can help generate such a commitment.