Project R-14236

Is the new EU regulation (EU 2023/1115) prohibiting the placement and export of certain commodities and products associated with deforestation and forest degradation enough to deter illegal logging? (Research)

Is de nieuwe EU-verordening (EU 2023/1115) die de plaatsing en uitvoer verbiedt van bepaalde grondstoffen en producten die verband houden met ontbossing en aantasting van bossen voldoende om illegale houtkap te ontmoedigen? The EU has been at the forefront of the fight against deforestation and forest degradation. As early as 2003, it tried to fight illegal logging globally by introducing the Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) and the voluntary participation agreements that go with it. These action plans were intended to help timber producing countries improve their forest management and governance by introducing certification/licensing methods and making the process more transparent. This way, the EU can tackle illegal logging and associated trade which in turn would help the union to mitigate the carbon foot print produced by the consumption power of the EU citizens. But the negotiations to implement these action plans were rather slow and difficult because of difference in views and administrative setup of the timber producing countries. Furthermore, not all timber producing countries were willing to participate and this particular reason helped to create leakage in the enforcement of the action plans. These action plans also had an additional shortcoming, European timber producing countries (eastern European countries which were not EU member states at the time in particular) were not included in the program or the EU did not try to implement these standards on them and this made it look like the EU was focusing more on the tropical countries and not everywhere and especially not on its back yard. But to overcome these shortcomings, the EU promulgated the Timber Regulation with the purpose of prohibiting illegally logged timber from its market. Even though this regulation was more efficient and had a legal teeth to it, it was not as efficient as it was intended mainly because of the differences, within the EU member states, in implementing the regulation and the different leakages that it created. Because of the above mentioned reasons and after conducting ex-post evaluations on both the FLEGT action plan and the Timber regulation, the EU has promulgated a new regulation which tries to cover the shortcomings of the aforementioned action plans and expands the scope of their application. The new regulation (EU 2023/1115 on the making available on the union market and export from the union of certain commodities and products associated with deforestation and forest degradation) expands the scope by including additional commodities other than timber and the products of the commodities. Before this regulation came in to force, the previous action plans only asked the legality of the timber in the source country and they only focussed on timber, but the new regulation expands on that by requiring not only that commodities and products be legally harvested but also the said commodities and products should also not contribute to deforestation and/or forest degradation. The commodities and products covered are also expanded, where previously the action plans were concerned with timber and its products, the new regulation covers additional five commodities and products. This PHD research will try to study illegal logging in Europe vis a vis the new regulation and will try to study the practical application of the regulation in selected EU member states. In doing so, the research will examine if this regulation will have any effect on the alleged timber rush and illegal logging in some of its member states and the business that are involved in it.

01 September 2023 - 31 August 2027