photo Mister Jo

On Wednesday 4th May, Indonesia's minister of forestry and EU trade commissioner signed a Voluntary Partnership Agreement in a bid to end the trade and importation of illegally logged timber from Indonesia's forests. Read the story here.

Home to thousands of rare and endangered animal and plant species, Indonesia's forests have suffered from illegal logging for decades. The new deal is a promising start and ClientEarth welcomes the legally binding agreement as Feja Lesniewska, our legal researcher for the Climate & Forest programme explains:

"It is particularly welcome to see the Indonesian and EU VPA agreement signed at a time when creating ongoing effective forest law and governance mechanisms is fundamental to achieving multiple objectives of forest communities’ rights, maintaining forest ecosystems and tackling climate change. The VPA process has wisely fostered a multi-stakeholder approach which provides opportunities for the forest communities and indigenous peoples to be actively engaged from the outset. Such an approach ensures greater legitimacy and compliance with the agreement and consequent law and policy reforms. The further implementation of all forest related law and policy, especially reduced emissions from avoided deforestation and degradation (REDD+), an international climate related initiative, would benefit from ensuring the participatory rights of indigenous peoples and forest communities building on the FLEGT VPA example.

The VPA follows a lengthy period of commitment, going back to the Bali Ministerial Declaration on Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (agreed September 2001), to tackling issues related to the harvesting and trade in illegal timber. Although the agreements are voluntary, once entered in to they become legally binding on the parties.

VPAs provide traders with a definition of what constitutes legal timber. All timber which does not fulfill the legality criteria is considered illegal and not permitted to be traded with EU member states. A supporting EU Timber Regulation (EU) No 995/2010 gives powers to member states to take legal action if traders are engaged in importing products using illegally sourced timber."

Should anyone need further convincing of the importance of protecting Indonesia's forests, take a look at this: