amendments 1 - 46...pe650.546v01-00 4/26 am\1203728en.docx en 1. welcomes the progress made through...

$: AMENDMENTS 1 - 46...PE650.546v01-00 4/26 AM\1203728EN.docx EN 1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements$
AM\1203728EN.docx PE650.546v01-00

EN United in diversity EN

European Parliament2019-2024

Committee on International Trade

2019/2156(INI)

28.4.2020

AMENDMENTS1 - 46Draft opinionKarin Karlsbro(PE648.523v01-00)

Stepping up EU Action to Protect and Restore the World’s Forests(2019/2156(INI))

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AM_Com_NonLegOpinion

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Amendment 1Karin Karlsbro, Jordi Cañas, Samira Rafaela, Urmas Paet

Draft opinionParagraph 1

Draft opinion Amendment

1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), especially in Indonesia, and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it remains an attractive alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation;

1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs) and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; Notes that to date, seven countries have ratified VPAs with the EU (Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Ghana, Indonesia, Liberia, the Republic of the Congo and Vietnam), among which Indonesia is the first and so far the only VPA partner with FLEGT licencing since 2016, and that the EU has concluded negotiations and initialled VPAs with Honduras and Guyana, while negotiations are ongoing with six other countries (Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Laos, Thailand and Malaysia); is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it remains an attractive alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation;

Or. en

Amendment 2Miapetra Kumpula-Natri



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1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), especially in Indonesia, and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it remains an attractive alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; acknowledges the importance of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation in preventing the entry of illegally harvested timber to the EU markets; calls on the EU to increase funding for FLEGT; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation as an opportunity to strengthen their enforcement and to widen their scope to cover e.g. printed products and wooden products; calls on the role of civil society, as a crucial source of information on deforestation, to be strengthened;

Or. en

Amendment 3Heidi Hautala, Saskia Bricmont, Anna Cavazzini



1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), especially in Indonesia, and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it remains an attractive

1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), especially in Indonesia and Ghana, and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it

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alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation;

remains an attractive alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation; Warns against recent development in Indonesia with regards to lifting FLEGT licensing which will seriously undermine the VPA, and calls on the EU to take immediate action, starting with enhanced dialogue with Indonesian authorities, in order to remediate this;

Or. en

Amendment 4Jörgen Warborn




1. Welcomes the progress made through Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), especially in Malaysia and Vietnam, and the increased dialogue between governments, industry and civil society in several countries resulting from the VPA process; is convinced that the EU should continue to engage with VPA countries to ensure it remains an attractive alternative to export markets with less stringent environmental standards; stresses that the VPAs constitute a very effective framework to establish good partnerships with those countries and new VPAs with additional partners should be promoted; welcomes the Commission’s upcoming fitness check of the FLEGT Regulation and the EU Timber Regulation;

Or. en

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Amendment 5Heidi Hautala, Anna Cavazzini, Saskia Bricmont

Draft opinionParagraph 1 a (new)


1 a. Emphasises the need to further improve implementation and enforcement of the EUTR to best preserve sustainable trade in imported and domestically produced timber and timber products; notes also that imports of timber and timber products should be more thoroughly checked at the EU borders to ensure that the imported products do indeed comply with the criteria necessary to enter the EU; stresses the strengthening of existing policies must go hand in hand with increased policy coherence to ensure EU policies, including trade, do not create negative impacts on environment or people.

Or. en

Amendment 6Emmanuel Maurel



1a. Stresses, in the wake of this wretched pandemic, that the majority of human pathogens originate in animals and that the destruction of forest ecosystems is making the outbreak of new pandemics more likely; calls, in this connection and in view of the lessons to be learnt from this unprecedented crisis, for a re-evaluation of our goals with regard to combating deforestation, monocultures and intensive forestry;

Or. fr

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Amendment 7Karin Karlsbro, Jordi Cañas, Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, Jérémy Decerle, Samira Rafaela, Urmas Paet



1 a. Notes with deep concern the recent developments in Indonesia regarding the discussion to lift FLEGT licensing, which will seriously undermine the VPA and the export advantages it provides to the EU market; calls on the Commission to take immediate action and through dialogue with the Indonesian government find a way to continue with the licensing, without jeopardising the integrity of the commitments under the agreement;

Or. en




1 a. Considers it necessary to tackle all the main drivers of global deforestation, particularly agricultural expansion, which account for an estimated 80% of global deforestation and which has its roots in the demand for commodities such as palm oil, soya and beef;

Or. en


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Draft opinionParagraph 1 b (new)


1 b. Urges the Commission to submit a legislative proposal to introduce a due diligence obligation on operators placing forest and ecosystem-risk commodities and products on the internal market to ensure that such commodities and products do not cause deforestation, forest degradation, and the conversion or degradation of natural ecosystems or related human rights violations; a similar due diligence obligation should apply to the financial sector; the due diligence obligations should apply to the whole supply chain and cover OECD guidelines on social responsibility and human rights in trade; an access to justice and grievance mechanisms for the victims should be an important component of this legislation;

Or. en




2. Calls on the Commission to step up capacity support to VPA countries in order to accelerate the implementation of the commitments made, including combatting corruption and greenwashing, enhancing good governance, and exploring the inclusion of more ambitious sustainable forestry provisions in trade and sustainable development chapters;

2. Calls on the Commission to step up capacity support to VPA countries in order to accelerate the implementation of the commitments made, including combatting corruption and greenwashing, enhancing good governance, and ensuring the inclusion of more ambitious binding and enforceable sustainable forestry and ecosystem protection provisions, including the protection of indigenous peoples and local communities rights, in trade and sustainable development chapters in its trade agreements;

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Or. en





2. Calls on the Commission to step up capacity support to VPA countries in order to accelerate the implementation of the commitments made, including combatting corruption and greenwashing, enhancing good governance, and exploring the inclusion of more ambitious, binding and enforceable sustainable forestry provisions in trade and sustainable development chapters;

Or. en

Amendment 12Seán Kelly




2. Calls on the Commission to step up capacity support to VPA countries in order to accelerate the implementation of the commitments made, including combatting corruption and greenwashing, enhancing good governance and transparency, and exploring the inclusion of more ambitious sustainable forestry provisions in trade and sustainable development chapters;

Or. en

Amendment 13

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Karin Karlsbro, Jordi Cañas, Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, Jérémy Decerle, Samira Rafaela, Urmas Paet




2. Calls on the Commission to step up capacity support to VPA countries in order to accelerate the implementation of the commitments made, including combatting corruption and greenwashing, enhancing good governance, and the inclusion of more ambitious sustainable forestry provisions in trade and sustainable development chapters in free trade agreements;

Or. en




2 a. Recalls that the objective of the VPAs is to provide a legal framework aimed at ensuring that all timber and timber product imports from partner countries into the EU covered by the VPA have been produced legally; and that VPAs are generally intended to foster systemic changes in the forestry sector aimed at sustainable management of forests, eradicating illegal logging and supporting worldwide efforts to stop deforestation and forest degradation;

Or. en

Amendment 15Karin Karlsbro, Jordi Cañas, Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, Jérémy Decerle, Samira Rafaela,

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Urmas Paet



2 a. Calls on the Commission to streamline and better coordinate its efforts in fighting illegal logging within the different EU policies and its services involved in the policies; calls on the Commission to negotiate timber import standards in future bilateral or multilateral trade-related agreements, in order to avoid undermining the successes achieved through the FLEGT Action Plan with timber-producing countries;

Or. en




2 b. Recalls that sustainable and inclusive forest management and governance is essential to achieve the objectives set in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Paris Agreement;

Or. en


Draft opinionParagraph 2 c (new)


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2 c. Underlines that the VPAs provide an important legal framework for both the EU and its partner countries, made possible with the good cooperation and engagement by the countries concerned;

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3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change while safeguarding avenues for legal trade;

3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change while safeguarding avenues for legal trade; noting that Indirect Land-use Change (ILUC) can occur when land previously devoted to food or feed production is converted to produce biofuels, bioliquids and biomass fuels; in that case, food and feed demand still needs to be satisfied, which may lead to the extension of agricultural land into areas with high carbon stock, contributing to global deforestation;

Or. en




3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change while safeguarding

3. Calls on the EU to strengthen international cooperation by increasing efforts in key international fora, including the World Trade Organization (WTO) and

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avenues for legal trade; the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD); calls on the Commission to investigate avenues for multi-, pluri-, or bilateral cooperation with like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change as a consequence of imports while safeguarding avenues for legal trade;

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3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change while safeguarding avenues for legal trade; calls for additional efforts in the coordination of choices regarding which species to replant in order to safeguard forests' resilience, based, in particular, on the diversity of the replanted species;

Or. fr





3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with other importing countries in the fight against global deforestation and climate change while safeguarding avenues for legal trade and strengthening

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sustainable land management and agriculture, as well as land tenure and good governance in the third countries;

Or. en





3. Calls on the EU to more closely cooperate with trade partners and like-minded importing countries in the fight against deforestation and climate change while safeguarding avenues for trade that complies with EU regulatory requirements and TSD provisions in trade agreements;

Or. en


Draft opinionParagraph 3 – point a (new)


(a) Recalls that the Renewable Energy Directivelimits the contribution to the EU Renewable Energy target of food and feed crops considered to have a high indirect land use change (ILUC) risk, and for which a significant expansion of their feedstock production area into land with high carbon stock is observed; notes that the contribution of these high ILUC-risk biofuels will be reduced to 0% by 2030; considers this to be a vitally important provision which limits negative and unintended impacts of EU's Renewable

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Energy policy on global deforestation;

Or. en




3 a. Notes with concern that research continues to affirm a worrying link between zoonotic diseases, such as COVID-19, and deforestation, climate change and biodiversity loss; Notes also with concern that commercial export-oriented agriculture remains a major driver of global deforestation, since around 75 per cent of all deforestation now comes from the conversion of natural forests for agriculture, and that around half of all tropical deforestation since 2000 has been due to the illegal conversion of forests for commercial agriculture;

Or. en




4. Underlines the importance of measures ensuring that demand is in line with the stated goals, as the EU is a major importer of commodities associated with deforestation;

4. Underlines the importance of measures ensuring that demand is in line with the stated goals, such as the Paris Agreement and the European Green Deal, as the EU is a major importer of commodities associated with deforestation, such as soy, palm oil, eucalyptus, rubber,

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maize, beef, leather and cocoa, which are often drivers of global deforestation;

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4. Underlines the importance of measures ensuring that demand is in line with the European Green deal objectives, as the EU is a major importer of commodities associated with deforestation; highlights that commodities like cocoa offer an early chance to make progress on such an approach, learning lessons from the FLEGT-VPA process;

Or. en





4. Underlines the importance of measures ensuring that demand is in line with the stated goals, as the EU is a major importer of commodities associated with deforestation; calls for stiffer penalties to be introduced in order to reduce the import and marketing of illegal timber into the European Union;

Or. fr

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4. Underlines the importance of measures ensuring that demand is in line with the stated goals, as the EU is an important importer of commodities associated with deforestation;

Or. en




4 a. Welcomes the EU communication on "Stepping up EU action to protect and restore the worlds’s forests"; notes that the EU has regulated the supply chains of timber, fish and conflict minerals, but not yet of forest-risk agricultural commodities; recalls that legislation regulating access to the EU market for forest-risk commodities would be the most effective demand-side measure to combat deforestation; urges the Commission to develop an enforceable framework for due diligence obligations in the entire supply chain of these commodities in order to identify, prevent, and mitigate environmental, social and human rights risks and impacts

Or. en


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5. Believes that the FLEGT licensing process complements voluntary third-party certification, and that it is particularly beneficial for smaller operators that often struggle to obtain certification through private sector schemes.

5. Believes that voluntary third-party certification complements the FLEGT licensing process, and that it can be particularly beneficial for smaller operators that often struggle to obtain certification through private sector schemes;

Or. en




5 a. Is convinced that green public procurement policies can play an important role in encouraging trade in legal and sustainable timber; notes however that most EU Member States have mandatory purchasing policies for central government departments and voluntary policies for local authorities that undertake the majority of public spending; calls on the Member States to improve their statistics on the volume of wood they purchase including the indication of how much sustainable, legal or FLEGT-licensed material might be included within their procurement;

Or. en


Draft opinion

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Paragraph 5 a (new)


5 a. Recalls that conflict timber is already an action area in the FLEGT Action Plan but that insufficient work has been done to address this issue; calls on the Commission to deliver on its commitment to extend the due diligence obligations provided by the EU Timber Regulation (EUTR) so as to cover conflict timber in the framework of the upcoming review;

Or. en




5 a. Calls on the Commission to tackle deforestation multilaterally, with the aim of, inter alia, speeding up negotiations at the WTO on an Environmental Goods Agreement;

Or. en




5 a. Calls for the EU to ensure the coherence of the VPA with all its policies, including in the fields of development, the environment, agriculture and trade;

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Or. en




5 b. Calls on the EU to strengthen the enforcement of the environmental and climate rules of EU free trade agreements (FTAs); welcomes the proposal to this end by the Commission in the European Green Deal to make the Paris agreement an essential element of future FTAs and its proposal to do so in the case of the EU-UK agreement; calls on the Commission to develop tools to monitor the carbon footprint of imports; calls on the EU to include a “hierarchy clause” in the Trade and Sustainable Development (TSD) chapters of future FTAs, whereby the stipulations of the international agreements regarding climate, environment, human and labour right, to which the parties adhere to, would take precedence over other stipulations of the agreement; calls on the EU to include such provisions in future FTAs that would allow the EU to organise inspections and verifications in cases of suspected non-compliance with provisions laid down in the TSD chapter and, as a last resort, to make it possible to gradually withdraw trade preferences in cases of non-compliance with these provisions;

Or. en


Draft opinion

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Paragraph 5 b (new)


5 b. Repeats its demand that imports of timber and timber products should be more thoroughly checked at the EU borders, to ensure that the imported products comply with the criteria necessary to enter the EU; stresses that the Commission needs to ensure that custom controls throughout the EU follow the same standards, by means of a direct unified customs control mechanism, in coordination with Member States and in full compliance with the principle of subsidiarity; believes that the EU needs to ensure imports to and production within the EU only support global supply chains and financial flows which are sustainable and deforestation-free and do not result in human rights violations by reinforcing private sector efforts through policies and appropriate measures;

Or. en




5 b. Stresses that corruption linked to illegal logging should be addressed in the EU trade policy; urges the Commission to include in its FTAs illegal logging related anti-corruption provisions that are enforceable and which must be effectively and fully implemented; such provisions should include underpricing of wood in concessions, harvesting of protected trees by commercial corporations, smuggling of forest products across borders, illegal logging and processing forest raw materials without a licence; further calls

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on the EU to enhance collaboration with organisations aiming to prevent global forestry crime;

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5 b. Stresses that clear commitments in the fight against deforestation are included in all new trade agreements including Mercosur and others;

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5 c. Recalls the importance of adequate access to justice, legal remedies and effective protection for whistleblowers in natural resources exporting countries in order to ensure the efficiency of any legislation or initiative; further calls on the EU to introduce a formal and independent complaints mechanism that would allow citizens, and local stakeholders with effective recourse to remedy, and a tool to address potential negative impacts on human rights, notably through the application of the State to State Dispute settlement to the trade and sustainable development provisions in FTAs;

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Or. en




5 c. Calls for the EU to address global deforestation also by regulating European trade and consumption of forest-risk commodities, such as soy, palm oil, eucalyptus, rubber, maize, beef, leather and cocoa, based on lessons learned from the FLEGT Action Plan, the Timber Regulation, the Conflict Mineral Regulation, the Non-Financial Reporting Directive, legislation on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU) and other EU initiatives to regulate supply chains;

Or. en




5 c. Calls on the Commission to take use of the new provisions of the anti-dumping regulation concerning environment and climate policies;

Or. en

Amendment 42Karin Karlsbro, Jordi Cañas, Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, Jérémy Decerle, Samira Rafaela

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Draft opinionParagraph 5 d (new)


5 d. Underlines that the drivers of deforestation go beyond the forest sector per se and relate to a wide range of issues, such as land tenure, protection of the rights of indigenous people, agricultural policies, climate change, democracy, human rights and political freedom; recalls that indigenous women and women farmers play a central role in protecting forest ecosystems; calls on the Commission to step up its efforts to address deforestation holistically through a coherent policy frame, i.e. by ensuring effective recognition and respect of land tenure rights of forest-dependent communities, particularly in case of EU development funding, as well as in the screening process of the FLEGT-VPAs, and in such a way as to enable subsistence in local community forestry, while ensuring the conservation of ecosystems; believes that gender equality in forestry education is a key point in the sustainable management of forests, which should be reflected in the EU Action Plan;

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5 d. Recalls that the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights must be respected; supports the ongoing negotiations to create a binding UN instrument on transnational

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corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights and stresses the importance of the EU being proactively involved in this process;

Or. en




5 d. Calls on the EU to make a stronger link between trade and development policies, inter alia, by better implementing GSP+ rules in partner countries; calls on the Commission to work with GSP+ recipients on forestry management action plans to ensure effective implementation of their environmental commitments;

Or. en


Draft opinionParagraph 5 e (new)


5 e. Recalls the importance of respecting the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights; calls on the Commission to be actively involved in the negotiations on a binding UN instrument on transnational corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights;

Or. en

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Draft opinionParagraph 5 e (new)


5 e. Calls for the suspension of the EU-Mercosur Agreement process until binding and legally enforceable provisions to address climate change, deforestation, biodiversity loss and to protect indigenous communities’ rights have been included.

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