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out the trade opportunities and subsidies provided through
FLEGT and REDD+, would be insufficient to stem the rise in
criminal cartels involved.
Improved collaboration between FLEGT, REDD+, CITES, IC-
CWC and the evolving LEAF-programme, should be consid-
ered. If coordination and subsequent funding of an interna-
tionally coordinated law enforcement and investigative capacity
is developed, including coordinated task forces in the countries
involved in producing, processing, exporting and receiving ille-
gal timber, the effectiveness of both FLEGT and REDD+ could
increase substantially. This could also ensure that progress in
some regions is not offset by set-backs in others, as cartels sim-
ply move their extraction activities.
Unless the profitability of illegal logging and laundering is sub-
stantially reduced and the risk involved substantially increased,
illegal logging and laundering will continue. As this report has
shown, there are many laundering opportunities for criminals,
who may even get additional benefits through tax fraud and
misuse of government subsidies. With the scale of the existing
illegal logging business, it is clear that there may be an increase
in international criminal cartels if these activities are not coun-
teracted in the near future.
This is of further importance as many of the resource regions
also have substantial illegal trade and extraction of other re-
sources such as minerals and earth metals. With advanced
laundering schemes, illegal logging is being linked more close-
ly to meat, soy, and palm oil plantation production, as well as
trade in minerals and money laundering. Already, illegal log-
ging is being used in some instances to cover for other types of
crime including money laundering from drugs (Austrac 2010).
Improved coordination between FLEGT, REDD+ and the de-
velopment of a LEAF programme could help stem the further
evolution of international criminal cartels in illegal logging.