The Workshop to Formulate the Road Map on FLEGT was conducted in Nay Pyi Taw in early November involving the national and subnational members of the Multistakeholder Group and representatives of the EU and the European Forest Institute (EFI), according to the Forest Department.
Moreover, an EU representative was in Myanmar in early November amid uncertainty about the status of negotiations on the voluntary partnership agreement (VPA) between the EU and Myanmar. Myanmar’s Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) process with the EU began in 2015.
One exporter said that timber businesses were under pressure from two fronts: increasing difficulty in accessing the EU market, and declining harvest volumes. The exporter said the private sector was in a weak position to tackle market access issues.
According to a source close to EU importers, the European Timber Trade Federation recently sent an expert from NepCon (a non-profit organization working to support better land management and business practices) to review legality issues in Myanmar.
The expert reportedly met with officials from several institutions, including the Forest Department, the Myanmar Timber Enterprise and the Myanmar Forest Certification Committee.