Voluntary Partnership Agreement

[1] The EU also commits to denying entry to any timber shipments from a VPA partner country that lack FLEGT licences and must therefore be illegal.

[2] VPAs are also intended to strengthen forest governance in timber-exporting countries by improving transparency, accountability and stakeholder participation.

[6] Among other VPA partner countries, Ghana is also in an advanced stage of implementing its timber legality assurance system ahead of FLEGT licensing.

[16] Other countries: Other countries in Africa (Sierra Leone), South East Asia (Myanmar and Cambodia), Latin America (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Peru) and the South Pacific (Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands) have also participated in informal VPA discussions with the EU.

[citation needed] In 2014, the [1] FAO-EU FLEGT Programme of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations published The Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) process in Central and West Africa: from theory to practice,[17] which documents and discusses good practices for stakeholders in partner countries that are negotiating a VPA - or due to enter into such negotiations.