The Vietnamese wood industry representants underlined that the country should adopt the EU strategy, thus reducing the consumption of illegal wooden products. This issue was debated in a workshop held by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the International Union for Environmental Conservation and the Danish Development Organisation.
The EU is a major importer of Vietnamese wooden products, Vietnam thus becoming the second largest timber exporter in South-East Asia, and the third in the world. In the last year alone, the wood industry recorded winnings up to 2.4 billion usd.
The growing demand for wooden products in Europe, North America and Eastern Asia forced these countries to create legal and economical systems designed to prevent illegal imports with wooden products, thus encouraging legal imports.
FLEGT - Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade is only one of the measures taken by 7 EU members, including: Netherlands, Great Britain, Denmark, France, Belgium and Spain.
In order to complete the Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade standards and to increase imports to the EU, Viertnam intends to cutt down timber imports from 80% to 20% by 2020 by afforestation processes.
Vietnam's timber products are available on 120 international markets, including those in Japan and USA.
This country's wood industry is represented by 2000 wood manufacturing companies, which create 250.000 jobs. |
