Forest Sector Reform Research Articles

Integrating multiple environmental regimes: Land and forest policies under broader democratic reforms in the Bolivian tropical lowlands

The paper uses a policy integration (PI) approach to analyse forest sector reforms in tropical countries, using the case of reforms that affected the northern Bolivia forest economy. The paper provides a brief overview of PI and then analyses the various reforms that all contributed to reshaping Bolivia's forest sector. The major related reforms are not only forestland tenure reforms, a new forestry law, but also important public administrative and democratic reforms. The case of democratic reforms linked with land and forestry reforms in northern Bolivia makes it possible to discuss environmental PI in a tropical context, and thus to review some of the key postulates that have been formulated on the topic, but which are to date largely based on empirical experiences from the northern hemisphere.

Toward a cognitive theory of shifting coalitions and policy change: linking the advocacy coalition framework and cultural theory

The advocacy coalition framework (ACF) has developed into a comprehensive theoretical approach to the policymaking process. Empirical findings have however posed challenges in understanding important questions about the identification of advocacy coalitions, explanations for possibilities and sources of shifting coalitions, and the role of exploitive coalitions in policy change. We argue that the integration of relevant aspects of cultural theory (CT) into the ACF provides answers to these open questions. First, the theoretical synthesis of both perspectives suggests an exhaustive typology of four distinct sets of policy actors’ cultural biases. In environmental and natural resource policy, they are mainly expressed by myths about physical nature that can be understood as deep core beliefs that entail, guide, and constrain policy core beliefs in the policy subsystem. Second, linking ACF and CT allows for the conceptualization of cognitive mechanisms for strategic cross-cultural alliances between different advocacy coalitions, which are enabled through specific shared or complementary core beliefs. Third, the synthesis provides an explanation for exploitive coalitions who take advantage of issues triggered by external and internal disruptive events through strategic issue (re-)framing and shifting coalitions that, together with ideological congruence related to veto and institutional players, make major policy change possible. To illustrate our theoretical arguments, we present a long-term analysis of policy change through forest sector reforms and forest certification in Germany and Bulgaria. We conclude by underlining the promising explanatory power of combining ACF and CT as a basis for developing a more comprehensive cognitive theory of policymaking in the context of environmental and natural resource management.

Democratising timber: An assessment of Myanmar's emerging ‘Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade’ (FLEGT) process

Amidst Myanmar (Burma)'s political reform process the forest sector remains an important area awaiting democratisation. Forests historically covered over 50% of the countries' land area, and have been of major importance for both local livelihoods, the national economy and ‘ecosystem services’ such as biodiversity and catchment hydrology. The export timber trade has however played a decisive role in determining forest sector policy and indeed has exerted a significant influence on overall national politics since the colonial era began and continuing to the present day. Under the post-independence military dictatorship the timber trade involved ever more unsustainable plunder, particularly from the 1970s, rapidly degrading forests. But now reform of Myanmar's timber trade is on the national political agenda, reform which will be crucial for the Nation's transition towards an equitable and sustainable development trajectory.New legislative measures within consuming countries, including the EU, to challenge illegally sourced timber and wood product supplies have begun to exert a catalytic influence on Myanmar's forest policies, and converging with domestic civil society pressures have led in 2013 to the initiation of a formal ‘Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade’ (or FLEGT) bilateral process between the European Union and the Government of Myanmar.This paper presents an analysis of the nature of Myanmar's current timber trade and of the challenges and opportunities for reform, particularly in relation to the emerging FLEGT process. We argue that there are eight key aspects of Myanmar's timber trade overdue for democratic reform, which the FLEGT process puts into sharp relief: 1) resolution of ethnic conflicts primarily in upland forested areas, 2) reform of forest tenures; 3) a review of overall forest sector policies and the appropriate place of timber production; 4) reform of military era state timber institutions, 5) a return to silviculturally based sustainable forest management; 6) restructuring of the timber industry away from ‘crony’ domination; 7) measures to combat illegal logging and assure the rule of law; and 8) citizen participation in policy development and implementation.This ‘shopping list’ of democratic reforms implies a major and undoubtedly difficult process ahead, and success is far from certain. From 2013 promising initial progress has already begun on several of these areas. However, although the Government of Myanmar may give the international audience the impression that it is rapidly democratising, on the ground only limited substantive changes are yet experienced in rural areas, and resistance to reform persists amongst the military and their commercial partners. A spectrum of possible outcomes for forest sector reform may be foreseen, from mere token improvements on the dictatorship-era ‘business as usual’ to a thorough realisation of democratic aspirations. The outcome will be determined by the balance of power between civil society, public representatives, timber merchants particularly the powerful so-called ‘crony’ and proxy military business interests, and the intermediating powers of Government (including a significant rent-seeking ‘shadow state’), the EU, and the international markets that drive the demand for Burmese timber. The extent to which the FLEGT process can reinforce the wider democratisation process may be a decisive factor.

Advancing small-scale forestry under FLEGT and REDD in Ghana

In Ghana, small and medium-scale forest enterprises (SMFEs) provide income and livelihoods for three million people and supply a growing domestic timber demand. However, most SMFEs operate in the informal sector, and thus have become a target for current forest sector reforms stemming from Ghana's involvement in two international mechanisms: FLEGT and REDD. This paper examines how SMFEs are being incorporated into FLEGT and REDD plans, and asks whether reforms under these mechanisms will serve to advance SMFEs in the country while tackling illegal and unsustainable forest activities. The analysis shows that FLEGT-related reforms will target governance issues downstream in the domestic lumber supply chain, without tackling a root cause of illegalities and challenges within the SMFE sector: tree tenure. In contrast, REDD planning includes a strong focus on the illusive tenure issue, but to date has placed little emphasis on SMFE promotion. The paper concludes that reforms associated with both mechanisms may work complementarily to advance a legal and sustainable SMFE sector, but only if local communities are incentivized to manage forest and tree resources through clarification of land and tree tenure. Reasons for why tenure reform has been such a sticking point are discussed.

Confusion vs. clarity: Property rights and forest use in Uganda

Projects and policies targeted at reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) frequently emphasize the articulation of property rights that are new, formalized or revised. A major question for successful REDD+ implementation, and forest sector reform more broadly, is how changes in formal rights are understood and internalized by resource users. This paper explores the determinants of knowledge of formal rights, and whether accurate knowledge of rights influences forest clearing and forest product harvesting behavior in Uganda. We find limited awareness of rules surrounding clearing forest, and mixed levels of awareness regarding rights to harvest specific forest products. Harvesting behavior is variably correlated with awareness of rights depending on the product and capacity of district forest officials.

Control and intimacy in the Amazonian reality: Newspaper rhetoric on forest sector reform in Peru

Public debates on the fate of the world's rainforests stretch from local to global, and local newspaper rhetoric reveals complex engagements among different stakeholder groups in the ongoing struggles over rainforest resources. We draw our case from Peruvian Amazonia, and focus on the public debate over the country's forest sector reform. Newspaper rhetoric, as we call it in relation to local rainforest discussion, is unfolded by rhetorical apparatus via social movement rhetoric to ideological criticism. We show how the reform has created friction between the control orientation of the formal and the intimacy of the informal Amazonian realities, and discuss the ways in which the role of international rules and global trade have both exacerbated these struggles and offered new space for dialog. Amazonian realities are not closed to outsiders – but they easily reject interventions perceived lacking local insight.

Forest strategy of German Development Cooperation with Africa

SUMMARY This article outlines the strategy, main features and priorities of German Development Cooperation in the forest sector in Africa. Details are provided from country case studies in Benin, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, Cameroon, Madagascar, Tanzania and the Congo basin region. In the forest sector, Germany supports the formulation and implementation of national forest programmes as an overall framework for forest policies in the countries concerned. Intensive support is provided in the fields of forest sector reform, forest certification, community-based forest management, and sustainable management of protected areas. Support is also given to establishing new instruments and strategies designed to secure sustainable financing for protected areas. German Development Cooperation will also strengthen the development of two new approaches in the coming years, namely regional integration — as in the Congo basin — and Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT).

Liberia: forests as a challenge and an opportunity

SUMMARY The imposition of UN sanctions on Liberian timber helped shut down Liberia's highly corrupt timber sector and bring an end to its long civil war in 2003. As part of its overall effort to support reform and reconstruction in Liberia, the U.S. Government in 2004 established the Liberia Forest Initiative (LFI), a cross-cutting approach to forest sector reform intended to build transparency, sustainability and good governance in the management of the three branches of Liberian forestry: the commercial sector, conservation, and community forestry. The effort quickly attracted strong support from the international community, including the World Bank, FAO, IUCN, EC, CIFOR, and Fauna and Flora International. LFI now functions as an informal multidonor partnership, working closely with Liberian authorities and civil society to implement far-reaching reforms and establish conditions that could permit the lifting of UN sanctions. The LFI partnership has achieved significant successes in terms of multi-donor ...

State actors' livelihoods, acts of translation, and forest sector reforms in northwest Pakistan

Forests in the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan are under heavy pressure. Often, local people are blamed in this regard for their exploitative resource use. The present paper, however, searches for an understanding of the ongoing processes by analysing the livelihood strategies and daily practices of representatives of the local state and donor project experts. Insights show that policy formulation at the provincial capital is not implemented in a functionalist manner at lower levels of the administration. Instead, many processes and acts of translation within the wider context of livelihood strategies take place along the actual practice (rather than the discourse) of policy formulation and implementation through the various scales from the head offices of donors in the North to the provincial capital in the South, to the regional centres and, finally, to the forests in the Hindukush–Himalayan mountains.

The Political Economy of Forest Sector Reform in Indonesia

Indonesia's forests are critical to its economic development strategy and to the global environment. Yet evidence of unsustainable management and insufficient governmental supervision continues to mount. After identifying two alternative positions in the debate on institutional reform, this article demonstrates the utility of the political-economy perspective for understanding some of the problems and prospects for reform in the Department of Forestry's roles as government landlord and conservation institution. Reform in the landlord role is heavily constrained by the patrimonial characteristics of President Suharto's New Order regime. Exercise of the conservation role flounders against organizational and structural complexity. Hence major reforms seem unlikely without a regime change, a critical shortage in timber supply, or external threats to Indonesia's exports of forest products.