Progress of FLEGT & REDD in Ghana: Addressing Key Community Concerns

1. ACRN REGIONAL WORKSHOP 2013 PROGRESS of FLEGT & REDD IN GHANA

2. PRESENTATION OUTLINE • Key Community rights concerns in NR in Ghana • FLEGT & REDD+ Commitments • Progress with FLEGT & REDD • Obstacles/concerns/challenges • Lessons

3. Key Community Concerns • Democratic participation of communities in forest decision making • The question of ownership of land & trees • Equity in the access to and the distribution of NR rents • A framework for greater role of forest communities in the management of resources • Capacity of communities in forest management

4. Commitments under FLEGT & REDD+ • Review the existing forest and wildlife policy • Develop subsequent policies to make them more responsive to local and global forest trends • Legislative review • Clean up the conflicting forest laws into a consolidated forest act • A legislation to give legal mandate to the new FLEGT institutions (Timber verification Department, the Timber Validation Council)

5. Commitment cont’d • Reform land and tree ownership regime to reduce conflict and give security to land owners and farmers • Benefit sharing • Reform the domestic market to make it legal • Domestic market supplies 84%-90% of timber on the domestic market • Law enforcement • Collective role of the state, csos & communities

6. Progress with FLEGT/REDD+ • A new Forest and Wildlife policy is in place • Has bold intentions for community participation in Forest governance • Plans to legislate participatory processes in forest governance • Opportunities for local forest communities to engage in forest enterprises – community forest plantation, wildlife management • A Forest Master Plan to be developed to implement the policy

7. Progress Contd • Legislative review yet to take off • Clean up the current permit regime (legality definition is different from the existing permits in Ghana) • Ministerial tuc will not be issued under the current minister • CSO will have representation on the Timber Validation Committee as Private sector • Consultation to include transparency annex

8. Progress contd • Consultations on the verification protocols • REDD+ pilots are taking place since 2012 • 7 pilots which are donor dependent • Swiss government has offered some support for the pilots to continue • REDD+ has stalled due to lack of funds • Climatic change policy

9. Progress cont’d • Tree/Land tenure reform is now beginning to take off • CSO have offered workable options models and alternatives • Three other tree tenure studies going on without clarity on where they converge • Domestic Market reform • Support to the Domestic Lumber Traders Association to self regulate • Domestic Market & public procurement policies have been developed to different stages

10. CHALLENGES • The timber permit regime • Conversion from Leases, expired concessions and tuc’s to TUCs • The authenticity of salvage permits • Review of stumpage fees & the fiscal regime • The practicality of artisanal milling as a solution to the domestic market problem • Costs and technology up which excludes the chainsaw logger • Access to raw materials • Realizing community management of forests

11. Working with industry to achieve common issues of interests has been poor • Direct representation of communities in the process(M SIC and other committees under REDD) • Level of consultation in the REED process is very low. • Linkages between FLEGT & REDD are poor

12. LESSONS • VPA provides some leverage for CSOs to get concerns on the table • Follow up with bills that go to parliament. A final-final draft bill is still not ok. • Beware of copy-cat processes – REDD processes which claim to use VPA consultation processes