IDH Timber program

The IDH Tropical Timber program promotes the use of sustainable tropical timber. For IDH it is evident that sustainable forest management ensures the forest is there for the future. IDH’s objective for the 2016-2020 period is to support certification of 2 million hectares of tropical forest – with FSC, PEFC or other credible standards – spread over strategic locations around the world. These locations will in some cases overlap with landscapes in which IDH works on preventing deforestation. In these landscapes, the timber program also aims to work on broader issues to support sustainable forest management and prevent deforestation, for example by working with national timber federations, large companies using local timber or alternative livelihood strategies. On the demand side, activities of the by IDH founded European Sustainable Tropical Timber Coalition will be scaled up to include sector wide action plans with timber trade federations, individual companies and municipalities in five focus countries: Germany, Denmark, France, Italy and Spain. Awareness of the fact that using sustainable tropical timber is good, to keep the forest is key. Since 2008, IDH has invested in promoting sustainable forest management, by supporting producers and mobilizing markets. It started with certification programs in the Amazon (Amazon Alternative program) and Indonesia (Borneo Initiative), and later the Congo Basin region, making the IDH Tropical Timber program the biggest forest certification program worldwide. By early 2016, over 8 million hectares of tropical forests in the three regions have been certified with the support of IDH, amounting to 50% of all current FSC certifications of forests in the tropics.