The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Forest Products Association of Guyana (FPA) on November 10 signed a letter of agreement as the local forestry sector strives to meet the European Union’s Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) due diligence requirements.
The US$102,400 project is being funded by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the FAO. The project is entitled ‘Building Capacity within the Guyanese forestry sector to meet European Union’s Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) due diligence requirements’, the latest bulletin of the International Tropical Timber Organisation (ITTO) says.
One of the requirements under the Guyana/Norway forest deal is that Guyana shows evidence of entering a formal dialogue with the European Union with the intent of joining FLEGT and moving towards a Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA). The two countries last November inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) agreeing that Oslo would pay US$30 million ($6.2 billion) this year and potentially up to a total of US$250 million ($51.7 billion) by 2015 for this country to preserve its forests. The first payment has been disbursed to the fund set up.
Meanwhile, in its fortnightly bulletin, the ITTO said that during the period under review, there were no exports of greenheart logs. However, purpleheart logs were in demand attracting higher average prices in both fair and small sawmill qualities. Similarly, mora log prices increased for all qualities.
For sawn wood, prices gained in the period under review. Undressed greenheart prices remained stable while undressed purpleheart (select) prices jumped from US$750 per cubic metre to US$1350 per cubic metre. However, the exported volumes were small. Dressed greenheart and purpleheart prices gained while undressed purpleheart prices remained unchanged.
According to the report, several Lesser Used Species (LUS) including burada, cow-wood, darina, fukadi, iteballi, itikiboroballi, muniridan and Tonka bean were exported as sawnwood during the period under review. The major markets for LUS were Asia, Caribbean, Europe and North America. In addition, roundwood, fuelwood and splitwood contributed to the total export earnings. Piles fetched a good price average of US$831 per cubic metre with the major destination being the US.
For the period under review, exports of value-added products rose.
The major exported products were doors, indoor and outdoor furniture and windows. Species used in furniture manufacturing included Crabwood (Andiroba), Kabukalli (Cupiuba), Locust (Courbaril) and Purpleheart (Amarante). These products were exported to the Caribbean and UK markets.
