Forests Sourcebook - HCV Resource Network

enterprises may be motivated to join the effort because of
market pressure or ethical reasons. Local people whose
rights are trampled by illegal loggers are potential partners,
as are NGOs concerned about protection of the environment,
human rights, and democracy. In addition, there are
always individuals in all stakeholder groups and institutions,
including public forest administration, who need no
other motivation than pursuit of fairness and justice. External
partners can reinforce and support these progressive
groups and, within the boundaries of their mandates, facilitate
their work at the political and technical levels.
FLEG processes should bring partners together. The
aim of a national FLEG process should be to bring all these
partners together to enable them to reinforce each other.
Although it is evident that there will not and should not be
any standard model for such processes, some common elements
seem to characterize the more promising initiatives
currently under way:
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Establishment of a mechanism for interministerial coordination,
and a forum for stakeholder participation
Use of an analytical process for assessing the magnitude,
scope, and dimension of the problems related to law
enforcement and governance
Creation of awareness, information sharing, and if necessary,
whistle blowing, to “name and shame” the worst
perpetrators of forest crimes
Use of a consultative and consensus-building process to
define the scope of actions and priorities
Detailed definitions of the actions, responsible stakeholders,
mechanisms of implementation, and financing
(both internal and possible external sources)
Obtaining political endorsement and support for the
FLEG actions
LESSONS LEARNED AND RECOMMENDATIONS
FOR PRACTITIONERS
General lessons
Successful change processes rely on coalitions of
several interest groups with different capacities.
Partners willing to support FLEG can be found among many
stakeholder groups, such as ministries of finance and local
municipalities, forest enterprises, local people, and NGOs. In
addition, all stakeholder groups and institutions, including
public forest administrations, house individuals who need
no other motivation than the pursuit of fairness and justice.
External partners can reinforce and support these progressive
groups and, within the boundaries of their mandates,
facilitate their work at political and technical levels.
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Where the economic stakes in illegal activities are high,
powerful interest groups can forcefully protect the status
quo even if the outcome is clearly negative from society’s
point of view.
Country-level lessons
Address key drivers both within and outside the
forest sector. Some governance issues relating to forest
crime lie entirely within the forest sector while others affecting
forests and forest-dependent people extend beyond this
sector. Some of the governance work of other parts of the
World Bank Group may help address these nonforest-sector
issues, including support to Poverty Reduction Strategy
Paper processes and the alignment of the World Bank’s
CASs with these processes, work on governance diagnostics
and integration of governance and anticorruption elements
in the CASs, and the design of specific capacity-building
programs based on the diagnostic surveys (Poverty Reduction
and Economic Management Network and the World
Bank Institute). Other relevant areas of the World Bank
focus on anti-money laundering and financial investigation
(Financial Market Integrity group, Extractive Industries
Transparency Initiative, Justice for the Poor, and customs
modernization). The World Bank’s legal department is carrying
out important work in assessing the quality of legal
and regulatory frameworks. Similarly, some of the work on
corporate social responsibility and social and environmental
issues in the operations of the International Finance Corporation
(for example, investment safeguard policies) is
extremely relevant to FLEG issues.
Combine actions with both short- and long-term
implications in a realistic, step-wise plan. Visible shortterm
impacts are often needed to create and maintain momentum,
whereas long-term work on the structural drivers is necessary
to ensure that these efforts are sustainable over time.
Early “wins” (for example, significant increases in forest revenue)
are important to motivating continued efforts.
Address both failures of law and failures of implementation.
First, ensure that the correct laws and policies
are in place. Second, work to enforce the law. This two-
NOTE 5.5:ADDRESSING ILLEGAL LOGGING AND OTHER FOREST CRIME 195