The 6th Session of the UNFF took place from the 13-24 February 2006 at the UN Headquarters in New York. Forests Monitor decided again (as with UNFF5) not to attend the meeting for a number of reasons. The first was priority, it was considered that there were better things to do than spend more funds on the hotels of New York without any visible benefit to the forests of the world.

The agenda was uninspiring and hope for anything positive to come out of a process that has been grinding to a halt for number of years was not high. Sadly, we were right in our estimations of the process despite considerable amount of hard work on the part of some delegations to achieve a positive outcome. Happily, we were right not to have put further effort and funding into the process at this stage.

June - November 2005

Europe and North Asia Forest Law Enforcement and Governance Process

At the beginning of June 2005, Forests Monitor attended the preparatory meeting for the Ministerial Segment of the ENA-FLEG in Moscow. The meeting laid the groundwork for the declaration to be concluded at the Ministerial level later in the year. The meeting can be considered to have gone well as many of the fundamental concepts of transparency and participation were built into the final preparatory documents.

From 1-4 November, FM was sponsored to attend The Forest Dialogue conference in St Petersburg, Russia. The conference brought together a large number of industry representatives and national and international NGOs for a dialogue in preparation for the Ministerial summit of the ENA FLEG process. Common positions on significant issues were reached among the NGOs and some with the industry group.

Between 21-26 November, Forests Monitor was identified in a selection process coordinated by IUCN as an organisation that should represent Western European NGOs and attended the ENA-FLEGT ministerial level meeting, again in St Petersburg. The meeting was frustrating due to the effective exclusion of NGOs from observing the dialogue, the negotiation sessions being closed and transparency in the process being less than that at the UN forest policy dialogues. As a result many of the recommendations made in the last days of the process where not taken on board during the ministerial level meeting. The final declaration did contain some useful concepts, however, and may be useful in any follow-up processes at the national level. In this respect, forests and forest related issues were pushed up the agenda in a number of countries in the defined ENA FLEG region and further moves in the international political arena are underway to tackle some of the underlying causes of deforestation and the development problems that this causes.

A Joint NGO statement was produced for the meeting to which Forests Monitor contributed. The statement can be found on the website of the Taiga Rescue Network, which was leading the coordination for Civil Society at the Meeting.

The official ENA FLEG website contains full reports of this meeting.

Nepal - Call for Expressions of Interest in Capacity Building Needs Assessment for NGO's Working on the Forestry Sector of Nepal's Terai Region - from Forests Monitor Charitable Trust
pdf or Word

Forests Monitor are seeking volunteers and paid translators to assist with a project based in Russian Far East and Siberia.

The volunteers should be very proficient Russian speakers, and able to translate from Russian, using specialised language particular to the field of sustainable livelihoods.

Forests Monitor are working with Russian partners to compile a training manual for groups wishing to monitor logging activities. We need translators who can translate from Russian to English and English to Russian, using technical and legal terminlogy. The manual will be 60/70 pages long and rates of pay are negotiable.

If you can help us with this work, please contact us by telephone on 01223 360975 or email to mail@forestsmonitor.org

Chainsaw Criminal: Wijma - by Forests Monitor, CED & Greenpeace
(pdf in English only)

28 April 2003

Chainsaw Criminal: Reef - by Forests Monitor, CED & Greenpeace
(pdf in English only)