Independent Forest Monitoring: What is actionable information and why is it important?
Independent Forest Monitoring (IFM) is evolving…
At its core, Independent Forest Monitoring (IFM) aims to provide objective and actionable information about the logging and other sectors related to forest exploitation. This information is vital to combating illegal forest degradation and deforestation. For example, both demand and supply side measures like the EU Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) and the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) aim to harness the power of the timber trade market to combat illegal logging. In order to do so effectively, they need information about the risks associated with timber exports and imports. IFMs are key to addressing that need. Additionally, IFMs, particularly programmes led by national Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) provide information to help drive policy reform, improve civil society-government relations and strengthen community rights.
The value of information produced by IFMs explains why donors continue to support their development and expansion. In the Congo Basin, for example, consistent funding from the EU, FCDO (DFID) and other donors has led to an expansion of IFM, which began with international NGOs Global Witness and REM two decades ago. There are now dozens of civil society organisations implementing IFM programmes in the region. Additionally, hundreds of local community members are getting more engaged in IFM via alert networks.
Not only are there more IFMs, but they are getting stronger institutionally by organising themselves into regional and national platforms such as the Plateforme Africaine de l’Observation Indépendante (PAOI). IFMs are also teaming up with international organisations like World Resources Institute and Rainforest Foundation UK to develop new tools such as the Open Timber Portal (OTP) and Forest Link to improve how IFM information is collected and communicated to decision makers.
… but there is a need to produce more actionable information.
Stronger institutions, broader civil society engagement, and new tools are all signs that IFM is thriving. And we can expect demand for IFM data to increase as policies to reduce imported deforestation gain traction, as we are already seeing in the UK and EU. This demand must be met with actionable information in order to maximise the impact of IFM on improving forest governance.
However, based on a review of thousands of data entries in the OTP, feedback from key decision makers including EU timber buyers, and our own experience implementing and supporting IFM programmes for over a decade, it is clear that independent monitors need to product more actionable information.
What is actionable IFM information?
In the context of IFM, actionable information is:
Information on forest illegalities & governance problems that is hard to ignore, but easy to defend
If commodity buyers, 3rd party certifiers, policy makers, law enforcement and other actors cannot justify inaction, congratulations, you’ve provided actionable information.
So how do we make information hard to ignore? Here are 3 ways:
- Provide meaning, not just data
- Follow best data collection practices
- Make information easy to access
Provide meaning
People understand meaning, not data. Imagine, for example, you go to the doctor for some blood tests. The doctor sends you results as raw data — white blood cell counts, iron levels, etc. What do you do? You call the doctor and say “I don’t understand what all this means, am I healthy?”.
Now imagine you, the IFM, is the doctor and the commodity buyer in the EU is the patient. You need to tell your patients what the data means so they can take action. In other words, tell them if there are risks related to legality, governance, environment, and/or human rights. The data exists only to backup your risk alert, just like the data on blood cell counts supports conclusions about your health.
Best data collection practices
Since meaning is derived from data, how the data is collected determines the accuracy and ultimately the value of the meaning.
Best practices are constantly evolving and vary by location, organisational missions, and other variables. But there are generally accepted best practices in the IFM community.
- 🔢Be specific: provide details about quantities, locations, time frames, actors involved, and other relevant variables
- ⚖️Know the law: prior to any investigation, understand the legal responsibilities, obligations and rights of all entities involved
- 📐Triangulate evidence: don’t rely on one source. The more diverse the sources the more difficult the observation will be to ignore or refute
- 🛣️Follow the evidence: adapt to wherever evidence may take you to uncover the underlying causes, which are often more severe than proximate problems
Easy to access
It’s impossible to take action on information if you don’t know it exists. And taking timely action is a challenge when information is difficult to access or to understand. Many IFM reports contain information that could be actionable, but it’s simply too difficult to digest, especially for the layperson.
Reading and understanding a 30+ page IFM report, often in a foreign language, is simply not feasible for most people.
That’s why the Open Timber Portal (OTP) exists. The OTP allows IFMs to communicate actionable information directly to EU commodity buyers and other stakeholders in an accessible format.
So, now what?
Put simply, to optimize their added value, IFMs need to reorganize their strategies and methodologies with one central goal in mind: provide more actionable information. Doing so won’t require drastic changes in budgets or staff. But it will require time to test and adapt different approaches and tools to make it happen at scale. REM is here to boost the transition to more impactful IFM globally.
About Resource Extraction Monitoring (REM)
REM tackles poor governance head-on. We differ from conventional NGOs in that REM establishes formal partnerships with governments of forest-risk commodity producing countries. We led government-mandated IFM programmes in Cameroon, Congo and DRC between 2005 and 2013 where we documented illegalities and governance problems, strengthened law enforcement and policies, supported design and implementation of FLEGT Legality Assurance Systems, and built capacity of national IFMs that continue to lead programmes to this day.
Our current work focuses helping the IFM community maximise the positive impacts of their work. This includes supporting development and application of the OTP, co-implementing investigations to test new methodologies and technologies, and sparking debates and discussions among the community.
You can read more on the REM website
