Second Joint Monitoring and Review Committee

The JMRC was convened on 24 November 2023 in Georgetown, Guyana. This second JMRC meeting was chaired by the Hon. Vickram Bharrat, Minister of Natural Resources of Guyana, and Mr René van Nes, Ambassador and Head of the EU Delegation to Guyana.

The Technical Committee of the JMRC, hereinafter called the “Technical Committee”, convened on 23 November 2023 between the EU and Guyana (hereinafter called the Parties), was co-chaired by Mr James Singh for Guyana and Head of Cooperation of the EU Delegation to Guyana Mr Joan Nadal Sastre. It was attended by other Guyana government representatives, EU officials, and VPA stakeholder observers. The conclusions of the Technical Committee are captured in this Aide Mémoire.

The Parties committed to making the Aide Mémoire, supporting documents, and presentations public.

The Parties agreed on the agenda of the meeting and on drafting this Aide Mémoire of the second JMRC.

Aide Mémoire, 24 November 2023 | Download

Presentations:

  1. DAI Presentation | Download
  2. JIF Monitoring Plan | Download
  3. Roadmap to Licensing | Download
  4. Rules of Procedure (RoP) | Download
  5. VPA Impact Monitoring Framework (IMF) | Download

First Joint Monitoring and Review Committee

The JMRC was convened on 29 June 2023 in Brussels, Belgium. This first meeting of the JMRC was chaired by the Hon. Vickram Bharrat, Minister of Natural Resources of Guyana, and Ms Jutta Urpilainen, EU Commissioner for International Partnerships.

The Technical Committee of the JMRC convened on the 26 and 27 June between the EU and Guyana (hereinafter called ‘the Parties’), was co-chaired by Mr James Singh for Guyana and Head of Cooperation of the EU Delegation to Guyana Mr Joan Nadal Sastre with the participation of the VPA stakeholder observers.

The content and conclusions of these technical sessions are captured in the Aide Mémoire.

Aide Mémoire, 29 June 2023 | Download

Guyana – EU FLEGT VPA Successfully Tabled in Parliament

Minister of Natural Resources, Hon. Vickram Bharrat, successfully tabled in the National Assembly, on Monday, April 24, the Guyana-EU Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreement or VPA. This will pave the way for greater cooperation and increase market access and market share with the European Union (EU).

This agreement was initialled in  2018 in Brussels. The VPA was then signed in December 2022 in Montreal, Canada, by Minister Vickram Bharrat, and finally ratified on Monday.

In November 2022, the Natural Resources Minister at COP27 in Egypt signed a Forest Partnership Agreement with the EU for €5 million to support sustainable livelihood in forest-based communities. The agreement was formally handed to H.E. President Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali in March of this year. Guyana is the first country to sign both the VPA and a Forest Partnership Agreement.

In 2012, a stakeholder-supported policy decision was taken by the Government of Guyana to enter into formal negotiations with the EU on developing a VPA. The terms of the VPA were negotiated through a collaborative process between Guyana and the EU, where both parties shared the goal of fostering good forest governance and addressing illegality.

The VPA aims to support governance reform and strengthen enforcement activities in Guyana with commitments to improve transparency, accountability, legislative clarity, and other aspects of governance.

When a nation becomes a VPA Partner Country, it can issue FLEGT licenses to its exporters under national FLEGT Licensing Schemes based on a Legality Assurance System (LAS) for agreed timber products destined for the EU. This system, which is rolled out at the national level, ensures that only legally produced timber products are exported to the EU.

To begin issuing  FLEGT licenses as required by the VPA,  Guyana is building on existing national initiatives like its Wood Tracking System (WTS) to develop a robust timber legality assurance, also known as the Guyana Timber Legality System (GTLAS).

Guyana also has a series of VPA Annexes, which describe the practical components for implementing the core commitments in the VPA in detail. Annexes provide information on the country’s laws that Guyana will use to monitor the agreement, timber products covered under the agreement, and other requirements.

It will also guarantee new donor revenue streams to support the implementation phase. However, local VPA ministries/ agencies must also budget annually to ensure that any gaps in their internal systems are identified and rectified.

The other VPA countries are the Central African Republic, Ivory Coast, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Laos, Liberia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Republic of Congo and Vietnam.

Source: The Guyana Forestry Commission

Council adopts agreement with Guyana to tackle illegal logging

The Council has adopted an agreement to improve forest governance and help combat illegal logging in Guyana. The Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA), which the EU and Guyana signed in Montreal on 15 December 2022, aims to strengthen law enforcement in the forestry sector and ensure that timber products exported to the EU have been legally produced.

The agreement with Guyana came about as a result of the Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) action plan, which the EU adopted in 2003 to tackle deforestation and trade in illegal timber. One of Guyana’s commitments under the VPA is to develop a timber legality assurance system to assess timber products and issue FLEGT licences attesting that they have been produced in line with national laws.

Guyana is the first country in the Amazon region to sign a VPA with the EU. Forests cover 84% of the country’s territory and play a key role in its economy, not only in the timber trade but also in areas such as tourism and ecosystem services. Maintaining Guyana’s forests also contributes to the EU’s wider goals of combatting climate change and preserving biodiversity.

Next steps

The Council’s adoption of the VPA completes the ratification process for the EU. The agreement will enter into force once both parties have notified each other that they have completed their respective ratification processes.

Background

In 2003, the EU adopted the Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) action plan. The aim of the plan was to address illegal logging and trade in associated products by:

  • strengthening sustainable and legal forest management
  • improving governance in the forestry sector
  • promoting trade in legally produced timber

In December 2005, the Council gave the Commission a mandate to negotiate Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs) with countries that export timber to the EU. It also adopted Regulation 2173/2005 establishing a FLEGT licencing scheme to ensure that timber imports from these countries were legally produced.

So far, the EU has concluded eight VPAs with timber-producing countries (Cameroon, Central African Republic, Ghana, Honduras, Indonesia, Liberia, the Republic of Congo and Vietnam). The VPA with Côte d’Ivoire has recently been initialled and negotiations are ongoing with five other countries (Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Laos, Malaysia and Thailand).

The negotiations between the EU and Guyana lasted for nearly four years and were successfully concluded with the initialling of the agreement on 23 November 2018. The Council adopted the Decision on the signing of the VPA with Guyana on 13 October 2022. The final signing of the agreement took place at the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Montreal on 15 December 2022. The EU was represented by the European Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, Virginijus Sinkevičius, and the Czech Deputy Minister of the Environment, Jan Dusík. Vickram Bharrat, Minister for Natural Resources, signed the agreement on behalf of Guyana.

Source: Council of the EU