The chase for legal timber: Developments in the commercial trade of timber in Ghana

Abstract

The quest for timber and timber resources and its corollary effects on forest degradation has in the last decade contributed to a series of concerted local and international interventions aimed at addressing the situation. These interventions have taken the character of domestic policies, international agreements and pacts and to some extent, domestic legislative reforms. The plethora of interventions have created a horde of laws and agreements with varying scopes and applications, multiple institutions with interlocked and overlapping responsibilities and uncoordinated and often undocumented practice in the commercial trade of timber. The focus of this article is to prod through the domestic and international legal and institutional architecture on the regulation of the trade of timber and timber resources. The article hopes to unearth the challenges in complying with these obligations and propose recommendations on the way forward.