The Global Development Alliance to Promote Certification and Combat Illegal Logging in Indonesia (the Alliance) has made substantial progress since CIFOR released the first Learning Lessons report on the Alliance in 2003. Major milestones between September 2003 and March 2006 include:

The design of a legality standard for Indonesian wood products;

The successful testing of an independent legality verification and timber tracking mechanism;

Creating awareness of the need for a regional approach to combat illegal logging amongst customs agencies;

The establishment of Forest and Trade Networks in Indonesia and China and recruitment of forest and trade participants;

The creation of...

From September 2003 to April 2006, the Alliance expanded its engagement with companies that have the potential for increasing the level of demand for certified and verified legal timber from Indonesia. Both WWF and TNC continued to cultivate relationships with timber buyers in Asia, Europe, and North America. The Alliance partners engaged several strategic Japanese companies with strong links to the Indonesian timber sector, including Itochu and Sumitomo Forestry. These companies have expressed strong support for the concept of Alliance activities, and have indicated that they expected to be able to give a preference in their trading with Indonesia, for...

Trade initiatives relating to environmental concerns are receiving a new impetus with growing global interest in governance issues. Over the past decade, international development agencies have increasingly recognized the importance of good governance in target countries, and this interest is reflected in various initiatives that have a direct bearing on the tropical timber trade. The relevant forestry issues include illegal logging and the trade in illegally sourced wood products. These topics are generally discussed under the heading of Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG), and today inform the agendas of major environmental NGOs, of national and sub-national governments, and of...

Some importers of Indonesian timber are insisting on legality because they see this as a step towards sustainably sourced timber, rather than as an end to itself. For several large private sector market participants, the motivation for seeking legal supplies of timber stems largely from the prospect of targeted NGO campaigns against them and/or their clients. These companies are therefore principally concerned about broad NGO consensus on the legality standards that they adopt. A major effort to design a standard that has the consensus of Indonesian stakeholders was undertaken by TNC in coordination with the UK-RI MoU process to combating...

Some government policies have acted as serious deterrents or disincentives for companies to engage in a program to achieve sustainable forest management. It is widely recognized that voluntary mechanisms, such as certification and third party legality verification, can only play a part of the solution to deforestation and that government intervention plays an important complementary role. However, experiences of the Alliance suggest that in Indonesia the government and more broadly, governance- is also a critical factor that can determine the success or failure of the voluntary mechanisms themselves.

Regulations for harvesting and transporting trees in Indonesia are currently very cumbersome,...

1. Keeping environmentally sensitive buyers engaged with Indonesian timber producers is an important activity that TNC and WWF might consider expanding. This may entail identifying more existing buyers of Indonesian timber products and working closely with them to put pressure on their suppliers to invest in SFM, or to pursue forest certification.

2. For buyer enquiries to create new market links that promote investments in SFM, they should meet the following criteria:

Prices and quantities that are high enough to compensate for the investment costs

Purchasing agreements that are long-term

Agreements that are backed up by personal relationships or other guarantees acceptable...