New report on non-wood forest products for people, nature and the green economy

EFI and FAO have published a report on non-wood forest products (NWFP) including recommendations for policy priorities in Europe.

According to a pan-European survey conducted in 2015, the value of NWFP collected in Europe is estimated to be €23 billion per year, of which some €3.4 billion are marketed through formal and informal channels. This ranges in the same order of magnitude as the total revenue from roundwood.

Based on the analysis of risks and limitations, the white paper stresses the urgent need for action and identifies promising policy options to be considered based on the specific regional, national or subnational circumstances to:

1. secure the conservation and sustainable supply of NWFP,
2. build competitive, equitable and sustainable value chains,
3. improve transparency, data and information flow on NWFP, and
4. establish enabling conditions in terms of policy, financing and innovation.

The policy actions suggested by EFI and FAO in their report target different levels of authority. They call on the European Commission to promote coordinated regional, national and subnational programmes which improve reporting for high relevance NWFP and encourage traceability, labelling and standards for NWFP, especially valorising information about collection and production processes. National or subnational authorities could adopt innovative fiscal and labour regimes and implement traceability systems where appropriate and sectoral organisations and companies could increase transparency of price setting and encourage vertical and horizontal collaboration along the NWFP value chains. The United Nations, international organisations and academia are called upon to support countries and stakeholders to carry out the above key actions, including the collection and dissemination of data and statistics on NWFP.

It should be noted that EUSTAFOR reviewed the report.

Read the full report here (EN).
The report is also available in Spanish here.