The three Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) is one of the regions where forests, forestry and forest industry play a very important role for society and economy. At the same time the Baltic States’ forests harbour a rich bio diversity compared to many other European countries. However, the region is still facing challenges for forests and nature conservation as a result of the very fast and drastic political and economical changes during the last 15 years.

A majority of the forests is nowadays owned by a large number of small private forest owners. Many of them lack knowledge, capacity and incentives for responsible long term forest management. In addition, established forest management models are often not applicable to small scale private forestry. Private forests of the Baltic States are supplying a disproportionate part of the harvested timber, often as result of unsustainable harvesting levels. This is a threat to biodiversity as well as long-term wood supply from this region.

Furthermore, there is still a widespread occurrence of illegal logging and other illegal activities in the forest sector, which is a strong impediment for the development of responsible forest management and corporate responsibility in the forest sector. The existence of a business environment with a high degree of illegal activity in the forest sector makes it very hard for individual companies to implement responsible purchasing policies including reliable tracebility of all timber products. Development of forest certification amongst private forest owners in the region is also strongly disfavoured by the current situation as certification standards require full legal compliance including payments of taxes and social payments. Policy work on illegal logging and forest crime is therefore a strong and necessary support for the work on responsible forest management in the private sector.

Goals

1. To develop demonstration forests for the demonstration of responsible small scale forest management in Lithuania.

2. To promote the uptake of responsible forest management practises amongst private forest owners.

3. To ensure that incentives for responsible forest management and forest certification are included in legislation and adopted by the private sector.

4. Active and systematic actions to combat forest crime from governments, authorities and the business sector in Lithuania.

5. Acceptance and support of the need for action against forest crime and related trade by key stakeholders in Lithuania.

6. Increased awareness about problems related to forest crime in Lithuania amongst internal and external stakeholders.

This project is a part of the WWF and IKEA co-operation on Forest Projects.