Reports

Loopholes in Legality: How a Ministry of Trade Decree Benefits Shadowy Timber Exporters & Undermines Legal Reforms

Legal loopholes in a 2015 Indonesian Ministery of Trade Decree are exploited by a coterie of timber traders masquerading as small and medium enterprises. This significantly weakens Indonesia’s flagship timber legality scheme by exempting 15 product types from requirements to certify timber sources and factory practices

The Hongmu Challenge

A briefing for the 66th meeting of the CITES Standing Committee, January 2016. Hongmu is the Chinese term for high-end reproduction furniture made from richly hued durable tropical hardwoods, a sector posting a significant threat to the timber species targeted.

Ending Trade in Tiger Parts and Products

Between 2010-15, nearly 30 per cent of tigers seized in illegal trade were suspected to be sourced from captive operations. Tiger farming and trade in captive tiger parts and products poses a serious challenge to enforcement and demand-reduction efforts

Bridging the Emissions Gap

A briefing to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change for the 21st Conference of Parties. With an ever-widening gap between what is required to limit global temperature rise to less than 2°C and existing mitigation pledges, countries must seize every opportunity to curb greenhouse gas emissions

Front cover of our report entitled Who Watches the Watchmen? Auditors and the breakdown of oversight in the RSPO

Who Watches the Watchmen?

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) is an industry body formed in 2004 with a mission to reassure consumers that palm oil bearing its certificate of approval is free from links with primary forest destruction, damage to endangered species’ habitats or abuses of the rights of indigenous peoples and communities