Distinguishing community forest products in the market: industrial demand for a mechanism that brings together forest certification and fair trade

Using&nbsp;cases from Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil and Papua New Guinea, this report looks at the demand for mechanisms that bring together forest certification and fair trade. It particularly focuses on the gap in detail about industrial demand to distinguish community forest products in the market. <br /><br />Little evidence links commercial forestry with poverty reduction, but community forest enterprises, especially those that are democratically run, are perceived to have brighter prospects. It is argued that forest-dependent people face both poverty and marginalisation. Forest enterprise of can increase incomes by selling products such as primary and secondary processed timber products, non-timber forest products or services such as tourism, watershed management or carbon sequestration. Timber is the most commercially important &lsquo;community forest product. However, forest producers must match what the buyer wants, often in competition with other more powerful, better informed and financed enterprises. The authors argue that support could usefully focus on a number of areas &ndash; for example improving rights for small enterprises, facilitating access to financial or business services, or opening up new market mechanisms. <br /><br />Key conclusions and ways forward include: there are many existing examples of attempts to distinguish community forest products in the market. The challenge, therefore, is not to decide whether to distinguish community forest products in the market &ndash; it is how to do it credibly<br /> with increasing community control over forests, companies will increasingly need to secure access to such&nbsp;forests. Developing mechanisms to assure that such access is to the benefit of the communities will become an increasingly important issue<br /> the current status of community forestry and the institutional momentum behind the development of a mechanism to distinguish community forest products in the market represents a historic opportunity, which must be seized with both hands <br /><br />