Forest Certification in Developing and Transitioning ... - UTas ePrints

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forest certification in developing and transitioning countries
Future Developments
There are at least three major factors affecting certification’s future development in
Indonesia. These are disputes over forestland tenure status, un-conducive forest management
policy and negative market responses to certified forest products. The new
structure of LEI as a constituency-based organisation will have a significant impact
on certification’s future development. By establishing a new type of governance it is
expected that LEI will have an improved capacity to carry out its important mandate
which is, among others, “...to evaluate the concession performance based on a set of
rigorous standards, but also to critically evaluate government regulations and practices
that do not support the effort to achieve sustainable management of forests”
(Salim et al. quoted in Elliot 2000). NGOs, academics, international organizations
and certifiers tend to stress the need for fundamental reform of forest policy.
Future Research
There is considerable need for forest certification research in Indonesia. Specific areas
of research include marketing, where there is a general lack of awareness of what
certification is, even though certification has been underway for over fourteen years.
Other research areas include the economic and social impacts of forest certification
for local governments, management units and communities around the forest area;
and the distribution of the costs and the benefits. There is also the need for future
studies on the impact of certification to reduce illegal logging, on its capacity to bring
about policy change, and on land tenure arrangements. Research could also be
carried out on the costs and benefits of certification in transition from conventional
forest management to SFM, on the role of domestic market, and on the impact of
CBFM certification as a tool for legal, economic and ecological recognition of
community forestry.
yale school of forestry & environmental studies