VIVAnews - Representatives of the Department of Forestry, the Department of Trade, the US government and European Union Commission have discussed a regulation for timber-importing countries. The meeting agreed to reject imported timber that comes from illegal logging.
USAID Outreach and Communications officer, Roman Woronowycz, said, Friday, Dec 12, that the meeting took place on Wednesday, Dec 10. "This aims at supporting Indonesia in advocating legal trading," he said.
The meeting resulted in a decision to initiate Indonesian Timber Legality Verification Standard. It is expected that the international regulation will reduce illegal logging. "It will also reduce any form of illegal activities such as money laundering and smuggling," stated Woronowycz.
This is in line with the decision of the US Congress which enacted the Lacey Act several months ago.
“The Lacey Act will help the U.S. to minimize the U.S. market for illegal plants and timber products," said US Ambassador for Indonesia, Cameron Hume as quoted in a press release issued today, Dec. 12.
Hume said that the Lacey Act is against illegal logging, illegal plant trading, product trading from illegal sources such as furniture, paper, sawn timber. "The US support the efforts of other countries to combat illegal trade in plants, particularly illegal logging,” he said.
"The regulation obligates importers to make statements regarding timber's country origin and type of plants contained in the products," Hume stated. "It requires importers to declare the country of origin of harvest and species name of all plants contained in their products."
In addition, European Union also carries out similar program through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade.
European Commission has set up a discussion on Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) with interested producing countries including Indonesia to create a system for preventing illegal timber from being imported to European Union.
We must send a firm message to timber suppliers that illegal timber or timber products will not be tolerated on the EU market," stated EU Commissioner for the Environment, Business Representative of EU Commission in Indonesia Pierre Philippe, as quoted in the press release.
Translated by: Bonardo Maulana Wahono
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