What is FLEGT?
FLEGT means: Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade. The European Commission released an Action Plan on FLEGT on 21 May 2003. This marked the beginning of a long process by which the EU aims to develop and implement measures to address illegal logging and related trade.
The Action Plan includes proposals for measures on a number of key issues, including:
- Development co-operation focused at addressing illegal logging in producer countries;
- Political measures to control the imports of illegally harvested timber into the EU;
- Public procurement that ensure procurement of legally sourced timber;
- Private sector initiatives;
- Financing and investments safeguards; and
- Conflict timber.
The political measures proposed in the Action Plan are:
- A new EU regulation setting up a voluntary licensing scheme on timber, whereby partner countries would issue permits attesting to the legality of exported timber, and where the EU would only permit imports of timber from partner countries that is accompanied by such a 'legality licence'.
- The development of a series of partnership agreements between the EU and timber producing countries, as part of the licensing scheme described above.
- A review of the options for further measures to support the FLEGT Action Plan, including further legislative measures to control the imports of illegally harvested timber.
The political measures proposed in the FLEGT Action Plan can only be implemented through a political process in the EU involving all political levels in the EU.