Project/activity information

PNG is committed to achieving sustainable management of its forest resources. Over the years, PNGFA has developed and implemented forest laws and policies to assist in attaining the objectives of sustainable forest management (SFM). However, weak forest law enforcement, including the lack of effective monitoring of forestry operations due to inadequate local capacity, is undermining the efforts of the PNGFA to achieve SFM to meet the requirements of some of its key markets. This problem has been highlighted consistently in recent years in reports by several international and local environmental non-governmental organisations (ENGOs). A cost effective forest law enforcement regime, complemented by enhanced capacity building for monitoring forestry activities, is now required to assure PNG’s markets of the legality of the sources of its timbers, as well as ensure the on going effective implementation of PNG’s forest laws, regulations and policies to support its sustainable forest management strategies.

The project aims to enhance forest law enforcement and adequately support Papua New Guinea’s SFM activities by:

-developing and implementing a cost-effective timber products tracking and chain of custody verification system, appropriate to the needs of the forestry sector in PNG;
-establishing a database on forest law enforcement, to assist in better monitoring forestry operations to detect illegal activities;
-enhancing the monitoring of forestry laws, policies and regulations to address illegal activities;
-developing and implementing standards including industry code of conduct for legal forestry activities consistent with the principles and guidelines of Forestry, Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT); and
-enhancing capacity building for forest law enforcement among the key stakeholders.

Using external (international) and domestic (national) expertise, the major outputs from the project will be:

-a cost-effective timber products tracking and chain of custody verification system;
-a database for monitoring illegal forestry activities;
-standards for legality and industry code of conduct; and
-stakeholder training in forest law enforcement based on FLEG principles and guidelines.