The government should consider introducing penalties on its own departments and agencies to motivate them to implement legal and sustainable timber procurement policies, a new report from the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) has concluded.
Poor implementation of government timber procurement policy has been a frequent complaint by the timber trade and the EAC’s report agreed that the policy had been poorly enforced.
“The government must also insist that local authorities and the wider public sector adopt timber procurement policies,” it said.
The EAC, chaired by Tim Yeo MP, said it welcomed Defra’s development of a timber monitoring and tracking system to address the problem and said an effective system was needed across Whitehall “at the earliest opportunity”.
The “Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation: no hope without forests” report also concluded that an agreement on reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation was required if a UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen during December was to be a success.
Timber Trade Federation chief executive John White welcomed the report as reflecting its own view that there should be a complementary approach to deforestation, with more benefits from working together than pursuing individual interests.
“However, we are disappointed that the committee did not go further, by highlighting the need for capital investment to be made in sustainable forestry management in order that it might compete with other land uses,” said Mr White.
