Diploma Thesis from the year 2011 in the subject Politics - Environmental Policy, grade: 1,0, University of Potsdam (Lehrstuhl für Internationale Politik), language: English, abstract: The problem of deforestation and forest degradation is currently highly prominent on the international agenda. In September 2001, the East Asia Ministerial Conference on Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG) took place in Bali, Indonesia and adopted the Bali Declaration. The participating countries committed themselves to strengthen their efforts in combating illegal logging and other forest crimes. In June 2010 the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) published a review of FLEG progress in Asia and the Pacific, keeping the issue a priority in global environmental governance. Although the region of Southeast Asia accommodates only 5% of the world’s forests, it accounts for nearly 25% of the global forest loss over the past decade, whereas illegal logging is the major cause (World Bank 2010). Therefore this region is closely watched by the international community regarding progress towards sustainable forest management (SFM). The practice of illegal logging leads to an estimated annual loss of US$ 15 billion in developing countries. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) recognizes the importance of FLEG as a way to hinder these huge economic losses as well as the environmental and social consequences. The improvement of the region’s reputation and competitiveness in the international market is a pivotal goal. Yet, deforestation and forest degradation remains an intensifying problem in the region. Traditional forms of state-led global environmental governance seem to fail achieving effective progress in governing the sensitive issue of forestry, where trade, environment as well as social values intersect. Due to the inadequate action of states, private forest certification schemes have emerged as a powerful and prominent type of non-state global environmental governance. This development led scholars and practitioners to consider non-state or private governance as a potential alternative solution for global forest governance. The aim of this thesis is to systematically assess the chances and limits of transnational private forest governance in ASEAN. The overall intention in writing this paper is to contribute to our understanding of private and public governance and their collaboration. Therefore the central research question of this paper is whether and under what conditions private sector involvement can increase forest governance in ASEAN.

"Documents the efforts of 16 countries in the region to combat illegal forest activities"--Foreword.

Key points: With diverse transboundary links in environmental crimes increasingly prominent, there is a need to identify tools to enhance international or regional cooperation in order to strengthen forest enforcement. Mutual legal assistance (MLA) has particular potential to facilitate cooperation across jurisdictions. Provisions on dual criminality and predicate offenses often limit the scope for MLA on forest-related crimes, both within Indonesia and in partner countries. Proactive establishment of bilateral MLA agreements could strengthen MLA use, including with countries where the financiers and traders often reside and bank. Existing platforms provide opportunities to operationalize country commitments to international cooperation on environmental topics.

Rapid economic development in Asia has seen a major increase in demand for raw materials, putting natural resources in the region and worldwide under increasing strain. The forestry sector has not escaped this development drive, with the result that illegal logging has left many countries in Asia facing environmental degradation and the impoverishment of communities that rely on forests for their livelihoods. As one of the world's main timber buying markets, the EU has taken the responsibility to prohibit the placing of illegal timber on its market, promote best practices in the international timber trade and encourage sustainable development of the world's forests. With these aims in mind, the EU set out a range of measures to tackle illegal logging in its Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, which it adopted in 2003.^The measures in the EU FLEGT Action Plan aim to prevent the import of illegal timber into the EU and to increase demand for timber from responsibly managed forests. The EU FLEGT Asia Regional Support Programme has supported the implementation of the EU FLEGT Action Plan in Asia since 2008. This programme improved forestry best practices in Asia by strengthening regional cooperation and promoting international trade in verified legal timber, with the overarching aim of contributing to poverty eradication and facilitating the sustainable management of the region's natural resources. These efforts have yielded results at regional and national levels. In Asia, political interest in forest governance issues has increased. Cross-border cooperation to ensure legal and sustainable forest management has also increased. Furthermore, Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs) are under negotiation and implementation in most ASEAN countries.^VPAs require countries to define legality for their timber and timber products. By increasing transparency in the forestry industry and promoting socially and environmentally responsible policies and measures, FLEGT is helping ensure that forests in Asia's main timber-producing countries are sustainably managed and that revenues from forest-based activities are more equitably distributed to benefit communities that rely on the region's forests for their livelihoods.