For each question, scoring was applied as follows:
- Does the policy exist? (0–2)
- Quality of design (1–5)
- Level of implementation (1–5)
Questions for producer countries
1. Legal and institutional framework
1.1 High-level policy
1.1.1 Does the country have high-level political and governmental mechanisms in place to tackle illegal logging?
a) Has a review of the causes and severity of illegal logging been conducted by the government?
b) Is there a national action plan in place for tackling illegal logging?
c) Does a formal process exist for high-level coordination of action on illegal logging across departments and sectors (e.g. a parliamentary committee or interministerial task force)?
d) Are there formal consultation processes in place for multi-stakeholder involvement in developing policy and legislation to tackle illegal logging?
e) Are there formal processes/policies in place aimed at ensuring a balanced participation of men and women in the development and implementation of forest policies? (Question added in 2018)
f) Is illegal logging considered in the country’s climate change strategy
(e.g. intended nationally determined contributions – INDCs, REDD+ strategy or other climate change national policy)? (Question added in 2018)
1.2 Legal and institutional framework
1.2.1 Is forest legislation and regulation coherent and unambiguous? (Question added in 2018)
1.2.2 Is the legislation and regulation for artisanal and micro-scale enterprises coherent and unambiguous? [i.e. considering all relevant areas of law, e.g. fiscal, rights of association, SMEs, forestry…]
1.2.3 Is there legislative/institutional coherence across sectors?
a) Are formalized forest laws and regulations consistent (non-conflicting) and harmonized with other laws and regulations affecting forests (e.g. for land-use planning, agriculture, mining…)? (Question added in 2018)
b) Is there a legal framework for selling or licensing of any timber resulting from forest clearance driven by activities in other sectors? (Question added in 2018)
c) Is there a legal framework for selling or licensing of timber produced by informal enterprises? (Question added in 2018)
d) Are there systems in place for cross-sectoral coordination between ministries and agencies responsible for planning and land-use allocation? (Question added in 2018)
1.2.4 Is gender considered within policymaking and implementation?
a) Is there a designated agency/focal point with the mandate to ensure gender perspectives are mainstreamed in forest policies? (Question added in 2018)
b) Are there processes/policies in place to assess gender impact in the development and implementation of forest policies? (Question added in 2018)
1.3 International engagement
1.3.1 What level of international cooperation has been shown by the country?
a) Does the country have formalized trade or customs arrangements with major trading partners e.g. FLEGT VPAs or Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) which include specific provisions on illegal logging?
b) Does the country have a system in place for sending and receiving enforcement alerts regarding illegal shipments in transit to destination countries?
2. Tenure and resource allocation
2.1 Tenure and use rights
2.1.1 Are property, use rights and tenure arrangements clearly defined, documented and secure (including those of indigenous and local communities)?
a) Does the law require that property, use rights and tenure arrangements are set out on publicly accessible maps (and/or GIS) and demarcated at ground level?
b) Are there formalized mechanisms in place for resolving conflicting or overlapping property rights?
c) Are there formalized mechanisms in place for accommodating customary rights in law and regulations?
d) Does the legal and policy framework provide for gender-equal use rights and tenure? (Question added in 2018)
2.2 Resource allocation procedures
2.2.1 Do resource allocation regulations and procedures include measures consistent with good forest governance?
a) Is there a pre-qualification process which is designed to exclude inappropriate bidders from resource allocation awards?
b) Is there a competitive award process which is designed to be open to all eligible bidders?
c) Does the law require prior informed consent procedures or stakeholder consultations for local communities (with respect to logging interests and rights) to be carried out?
d) Are measures to protect and develop forest-based livelihood opportunities for local communities within concession areas built into concession contracts?
3. Regulating demand
3.1 Legislation and regulations on illegally sourced timber
3.1.1 Does the country have adequate legislation and regulations in place to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported or sold?
a) Has the country analysed its existing legislation and regulations on preventing imports and sales of illegally sourced timber? (Question added in 2018)
b) Has additional legislation been enacted and regulations put in place to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported or sold?
c) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, how broad is the product scope of this legislation? (Question added in 2018)
d) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, does it apply only to importers and those that first place on the market, or to all those along the supply chain? (Question added in 2018)
e) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, does it include a requirement on businesses to implement due diligence? (Question added in 2018)
f) Is implementation of the policy systematically monitored and assessed? (Question added in 2018)
3.2 Policies and measures to promote demand for legal timber
3.2.1 Is there a public procurement policy in place excluding illegal (and/or unsustainable) timber products from government purchasing? (Question added in 2018)
a) What level of adherence does the policy require? (Question added in 2018)
b) Does the policy cover all timber products, including paper? (Question added in 2018)
c) Does the policy rest on independent certification or verification schemes (or equivalent) for identifying legal products? (Question added in 2018)
d) Is assistance offered to government purchasers (advice, guidance, training, etc)? (Question added in 2018)
e) Is implementation of the policy systematically monitored and assessed? (Question added in 2018)
f) Does the procurement policy apply to subnational (provincial, regional, local) government? (Question added in 2018)
3.2.2 Do forest-related policies encourage legal timber production and discourage illegal timber production by ensuring that the level of demand does not exceed legal supply?
a) Does the permitting system for primary wood processing facilities require evidence of sufficient legal sources of raw material?
4. Transparency
4.1 Institutional and legal transparency
4.1.1 Is there a unified document which describes the roles, responsibilities and controls for all agencies involved in regulating forest utilization and trade from harvest rights allocation to point of sale or export, and is it accessible to the public?
4.1.2 Is there a legal requirement to make forest legislation and regulations readily accessible to the public? (Question added in 2018)
4.2 Resource allocation, management and enforcement
4.2.1 Do policies, laws or regulations contain provisions designed to ensure that resource allocation and management is carried out transparently?
a) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that rules for resource allocation processes (e.g. concession allocation and competitions) are made publicly available?
b) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that dates for when resource allocation processes are to be held are made publicly available?
c) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that the results of resource allocation processes are made publicly available (e.g. bids and awards for concession allocation and competitions)?
d) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that up to date summary data is published on harvesting, processing and international trade?
4.2.2 Do policies, laws or regulations contain provisions designed to ensure transparency in concession use?
a) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that information on location of concessions, ownership and contact details is publicly available?
b) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that information on concession contracts, inventories and plans are publicly available (i.e. long term and annual forest management and harvest plans)?
c) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that results of environmental and social impact assessments and mitigation measures are publicly available?
4.2.3 Do policies, laws or regulations contain provisions designed to ensure that information on enforcement activities is publicly available?
a) Do policies, laws or regulations stipulate that data is published on forest crimes, including success rates on detection, interdiction, prosecution and conviction (including fines levied and fines paid) and volumes seized?
b) Do policies, laws and regulations stipulate that information on disposals of confiscated wood or results of public auctions of confiscated wood (or other kinds of public bidding) are publicly available?
4.3 Information and data management
4.3.1 Is there an up-to-date, accurate information management system in place through which relevant government agencies can access data related to forest enforcement and management?
4.3.2 Is there an up-to-date, accurate information system in place to gather data on employment in the forest sector? (Question added in 2018)
4.4 Financial management
4.4.1 Is there an effective financial management system in place for the forest sector?
a) Does the forest administration have a system for monitoring revenue collected from utilization of forest resources against revenue owed, as well as a procedure for investigating discrepancies?
b) Is there an audit of the forest administration whose findings are publicly available?
4.4.2 Does the country report on its forest sector to the EITI? (Question added in 2018)
5. Rule of law
5.1 Checks and balances
5.1.1 Are mechanisms (checks and balances) in place to ensure government fully applies forest law and regulations?
a) Does the law make provisions for protecting the right of the public to mount legal challenges against forest management decisions/practices and failure by government to apply forest law?
b) Does the law stipulate penalties for staff for corruption?
c) Does the law include clear limits to the power of Forest Ministers (or equivalent) or other senior government officials to override forest-related laws, regulations and procedures (e.g. concession allocation procedures) – i.e. does the law limit discretionary powers?
d) Does a parliamentary committee (or equivalent) have formal oversight over the national government forest service and associated agencies?
e) Is there a system in place through which relevant government departments and agencies carry out self-monitoring of their performance and internal corruption investigation (this could be carried out by an internal or external inspectorate) which includes making the findings public?
f) Is there an independent national forest monitoring system in place?
5.1.2 Is customs specifically mandated to check that timber consignments meet the country’s forestry-specific legal export requirements?
5.2 Timber tracking and chain of custody
5.2.1 Are there effective mechanisms in place to detect instances of illegal timber entering the supply chain?
a) Is there a system in place designed to verify the origin of timber (i.e. forest management unit) in transport, transfer and delivery?
b) Does the system design include the following components?
- i) independent monitoring procedures (independent government body or third party)
- ii) reconciliation systems
- iii) tamper-resistant documentation procedures
- iv) computerized systems
c) Does the system also cover timber for the domestic market (as compared to systems explicitly targeting exports)? (Question added in 2018)
5.3 Law enforcement
5.3.1 Do policies, laws, regulations and procedures facilitate and promote effective law enforcement?
a) Are penalties and sanctions against illegal logging and forest-related crime proportionate and dissuasive?
- i) For legislation on domestic production and trade
- ii) For legislation to prevent the import of illegal timber (if in place)
b) Are there systems in place to ensure coordination between relevant ministries and agencies on illegal logging cases?
5.3.2 Do government institutions and agencies have sufficient capacity and resources to monitor forest areas and detect and suppress forest crime?
a) Are forest officials/law enforcement staff sufficiently resourced for monitoring and enforcement? (Relevant resources include budgets; numbers of staff; communications; transport; equipment; and salaries, as well as training in understanding of regulatory framework and knowledge of techniques for monitoring and enforcement.)
b) Are the following non-forest sector officials, who are involved in forest enforcement, trained and kept up to date in relevant forest sector issues?
- i) judges and prosecutors
- ii) customs officials
5.3.3 Do government agencies systematically use appropriate information-gathering tools in order to identify illegal activities?
a) Are remote sensing systems used for this purpose (such as satellite imagery and/or aerial surveillance)?
b) Are in-the-field investigatory tools used for this purpose (such as confidential diagnostic surveys, informants and NGOs)?
c) Are material flow analyses used for this purpose (such as wood input/output estimates, comparison of import/export data)?
d) Are log tracking and check point systems used for this purpose?
Questions for processing and consumer countries
1. Legal and institutional framework
1.1 High-level policy
1.1.1 Does the country have high-level political and governmental mechanisms in place to tackle illegal logging?
a) Has a review been carried out which both assesses how the country’s market activities impact on the problem of illegal logging and related trade and also investigates the extent and sources of potential illegal imports?
b) Is a national action plan in place for preventing illegally sourced timber from being imported or sold?
c) Does a formal process exist for high-level coordination of action on illegal logging across departments and sectors (e.g. a parliamentary committee or interministerial task force)?
d) Are there formal consultation processes in place for multi-stakeholder involvement in developing policy and legislation to tackle illegal logging? These processes should ensure that viewpoints of stakeholders affected by legislation are taken into consideration.
e) Are there formal processes/policies in place aimed at ensuring a balanced participation of men and women in the development and implementation of forest sector policies? (Question added in 2018)
f) Is illegal logging considered in the country’s climate change strategy (NDC or other climate change national policies – e.g. in relation to embedded deforestation in imports)? (Question added in 2018)
1.2 International engagement
1.2.1 What level of international cooperation is shown by the country?
a) Does the country have formalized trade or customs arrangements with major trading partners e.g. FLEGT VPAs or Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) which include specific provisions on illegal logging?
b) Does the country have a formalized system in place for sending and receiving enforcement alerts regarding illegal shipments in transit to destination countries?
2. Regulating demand
2.1 Legislation and regulations on illegally sourced timber
2.1.1 Does the country have adequate legislation and regulations in place to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported or sold?
a) Has the country analysed its existing legislation and regulations on preventing imports and sales of illegally sourced timber?
b) Has additional legislation been enacted and regulations put in place to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported or sold?
c) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, how broad is the product scope of this legislation?
d) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, does it apply only to importers or to all those along the supply chain?
e) If there is legislation in place to prevent the import of illegal timber, does it include a requirement on businesses to implement due diligence?
f) Is implementation of the policy systematically monitored and assessed?
2.2 Policies and measures concerning demand for legal timber
2.2.1 Is there a public procurement policy in place excluding illegal (and/or unsustainable) timber products from government purchasing?
a) What level of adherence does the policy require?
b) Does the policy cover all timber products, including paper?
c) Does the policy rest on independent certification or verification schemes (or equivalent) for identifying legal products?
d) Is assistance offered to government purchasers (advice, guidance, training, etc.)?
e) Is implementation of the policy systematically monitored and assessed?
f) Does the procurement policy apply to subnational (provincial, regional, local) government?
3. Rule of law
3.1 Law enforcement
3.1.1 Do government institutions and agencies have sufficient capacity and resources to monitor trade in timber products and detect and suppress any related crime?
a) Are the relevant law enforcement staff sufficiently resourced for monitoring and enforcement? i.e. competent authorities for legislation to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported? (Question added in 2018)
b) Are the following officials who are involved in forest sector enforcement, trained and kept up to date on relevant forest sector issues? (Question added in 2018)
- i) customs officials
- ii) judges and prosecutors (Question added in 2018)
3.1.2 Are the penalties/sanctions for non-compliance with legislation to prevent illegally sourced timber from being imported (if in place) proportionate and dissuasive? (Question added in 2018)
