Chatham House release landmark study on Illegal Logging

Chatham House have released a landmark study examining the efforts in the past decade to control illegal logging in nations that consume, produce and process wood and wood products. The report, titled “Illegal Logging and Related Trade: Indicators of the Global Response” has been written by Sam Lawson and Larry Macfaul, and assesses the response and progress to illegal logging in 12 countries – five producer countries (Brazil, Cameroon, Ghana, Indonesia and Malaysia), two processing countries (China and Vietnam) and five consumer countries (Japan, the USA, the UK, France and the Netherlands).

Together, these countries represent not only a large part of the problem but also potential solutions, as demonstrated by the report’s findings. In addition to measuring the extent to which illegal logging and associated trade has changed over time, the study examines how attention to the problem has changed and how governments and the private sector have responded.

The study finds that while illegal logging remains a major problem, the impact of the response has been considerable. Illegal logging is estimated to have fallen during the last decade by 50 per cent in Cameroon, by between 50 and 75 per cent in the Brazilian Amazon, and by 75 per cent in Indonesia, while imports of illegally sourced wood to the seven consumer and processing countries studied are down 30 per cent from their peak.

All five consumer countries assessed have shown considerable improvement over the last few years in their governmental response to illegal logging and associated trade. Overall, the UK and the Netherlands receive the highest scores on the assessment of relevant policies for procuring legal timber products.  Additionally, the report refers to a 2009 study by PWC, which “judged that the Netherlands and the UK were among the seven ‘best performing’ EU member states on wood procurement, and found that the UK had the highest level of implementation in the EU in terms of minimum legal requirements”. The report highlights that, “CPET has been very effective in improving implementation...”.

The report concludes that although there has been great progress made in tackling illegal logging, there is still a significant amount of work to be done at the producer and consumer level, with both having a role to play in halting illegal logging and incentivising the production of legal timber products.  

Please find the report  here or on the Chatham House, Illegal Logging website.