This document
outlines the content of the voluntary agreement between the European Union
and Cameroon on forest law enforcement, governance and trade in timber and derived
products to the EU (FLEGT).
Its main provisions may be summarised as
follows:
Objective: The objective of this Agreement (hereinafter the "VPA")
is to provide a legal framework aimed at ensuring that all imports into the
Union from Cameroon of timber and derived products covered by this Agreement
have been legally produced or acquired. It lays down, in particular, a FLEGT
licensing scheme based on controlling the supply chain.
The Parties are required:
- to promote
trade in timber and derived products;
- to establish
a basis for dialogue and cooperation;
- to promote
the development of the forest industries in Cameroon and to thereby
improve the competitiveness of the sector;
- to create
and encourage economic opportunities for resident local communities and local
enterprises;
- to
strengthen the capacities of actors in Cameroon by encouraging the
creation of a favourable climate for investment in the sustainable
management of forests.
Scope: this Agreement applies to all timber and derived products that
come under the FLEGT licence scheme and are listed in the annex. Overall, the
agreement covers more than the products in Annex II of Regulation (EC) No
2173/2005 (or the ‘FLEGT Regulation’) and concerns all forestry products. Cameroon thus undertakes to introduce a system which will provide the EU with the assurance
that all forest products coming from that country are harvested and
produced legally.
In particular,
the Agreement provides for:
- a FLEGT
licensing scheme with a set of procedures and requirements aimed at
verifying and attesting, by means of FLEGT licences, that timber and
derived products shipped to the Union have been legally produced or
acquired. The Union shall accept such shipments from Cameroon for import
into the Union only if they are covered by those FLEGT licences;
- a licensing
authority: licensing authorities must be established as well as
control authorities in the EU responsible for checking imports coming
into the European Union;
- the drawing
up of the Cameroon FLEGT licence in the same format as that in
the EU;
- a dialogue
and cooperation mechanism with the EU on the FLEGT scheme, in the
form of a Joint Implementation Council and a consultative structure
called the Joint Monitoring Committee;
- supporting
measures: including development measures
such as i) local development support; ii) promotion of forestry sector
industrialisation; iii) capacity building. The provision of additional
resources shall be subject to the procedures governing Union aid, as set
out in the Cotonou Agreement, and to those governing the bilateral aid
given to Cameroon by each of the Member States of the Union;
- market-related
incentives including the encouragement of
public and private procurement policies that recognise efforts to ensure
a supply of legally harvested forest produce;
- participation
of the stakeholders, the introduction of
social safeguards, transparency, monitoring of effects and the drawing
up of enforcement reports;
- a schedule for implementation
and procedures for the Agreement’s entry into force. The Agreement will
have an initial duration of seven years and shall be renewable by tacit
agreement;
- a simplified procedure for amending
the annexes.