International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO)

Organizational profile: 

The International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO) is an intergovernmental organization promoting the sustainable management and conservation of tropical forests and the expansion and diversification of international trade in tropical timber from sustainably managed and legally harvested forests.  

ITTO is an action and field-oriented organization with more than 30 years of experience. It has funded and assisted in the implementation of more than 1200 projects and other activities addressing the many aspects of SFM, such as forest restoration; wood-use efficiency; the competitiveness of wood products; market intelligence and transparency in the tropical timber trade and tropical timber supply chains; forest law enforcement and governance; illegal logging; biodiversity conservation; climate-change mitigation and adaptation; the contributions of non-timber forest products and environmental services; and the livelihoods of forest-dependent communities. 

ITTO’s membership represents about 90% of the global tropical timber trade and more than 80% of the world’s tropical forests. 
 
The Organization has six major focus areas.  
•    Sustainable forest management:  
•    Economics, statistics and markets 
•    Sustainable forest industries 
•    Climate-change mitigation and adaptation 
•    Capacity building 
•    Contributions to Sustainable Development Goals

Financing Instrument: Grants, Technical Assistance

Project scale:  Accepted project proposals have ranged from US$ 65,000 to 1,339,000. 

Recipient countries regions/country groups: Global, with a focus on tropical member countries of ITTO (www.itto.int/about_itto/members/).

Recipient categories: Governments

Eligibility Criteria: ITTO member countries are eligible to submit project, small project, and pre-project proposals as well as concept notes. They must be in good standing without any outstanding arrears in payment of membership fees for two consecutive years, or with cumulative arrears beginning from 2002 equal to or in excess of three times the annual assessed contribution in the year the proposal is submitted.

Project proposals submitted to ITTO should be consistent with the current ITTO Action Plan and the national forestry policy of the submitting member countries [Decision 4(XXV), Annex A]. The proposals should also consider relevance to ITTA objectives and adherence to the organization’s various policy guidelines developed which are available at the ITTO website (www.itto.int/guidelines/).

Application guidelines: ITTO periodically places calls for proposals posted its website at www.itto.int/call_proposals/.  ITTO project proposals are usually developed by a proponent in an ITTO member country in consultation with the ITTO official contact point.  Only ITTO member countries, through the official contact point, may submit proposals to ITTO for financing. ITTO has a detailed project formulation manual which lays out the required content and format for proposals (www.itto.int/projects/formulation_manuals/). Concept notes are submitted online when a call is open at www.itto.int/concept_note/login/.

ITTO recognizes three types of project submissions:

• A project proposal is the most substantial document and is required for any set of activities with a total ITTO budget of more than US$150,000. The preparation of a project proposal requires substantial work to communicate and coordinate with stakeholders, collect and analyse information, and draft an articulated document. ITTO is however in the process of piloting its Programmatic Approach and a streamlined project cycle which offers the opportunity to submit project concept notes rather than a fully developed project proposal. Concept notes will be developed into full project proposals if a donor expresses interest. 
• A small project proposal may be formulated for projects with a duration not exceeding two years and requiring funds from ITTO not exceeding US$150,000 for such proposals.
• A pre-project proposal is designed to facilitate the set of preparatory and/or experimental activities to formulate a project proposal.

Membership procedure
A government, through its Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York, USA, may contact the Secretary-General of the United Nations in his capacity as depositary of the ITTA, 2006 (through the Treaty Section, Office of Legal Affairs, New York, USA, e-mail: treatysection@un.org), as follows:

(i)    Countries that signed the ITTA, 2006, within the time limit set in paragraph 1 of Article 36 may deposit an Instrument of Ratification, Acceptance or Approval with the Secretary-General of the United Nations.
(ii)    Countries that did not sign the ITTA, 2006, within the time limit set in paragraph 1 of Article 36 (7 January 2012) may accede to the ITTA, 2006, by depositing an instrument of accession with the Secretary-General of the United Nations in accordance with Article 37 of the ITTA, 2006. Decision 7(XLVIII) of the International Tropical Timber Council “Establishment of Conditions for Accession to the International Tropical Timber Agreement, 2006” provides further clarification (see link below).

On completion of formalities (i) or (ii) above, the Secretary-General of the United Nations (through the Treaty Section, Office of Legal Affairs) will issue a Depositary Notification specifying the date of deposit of the instrument which is the same date the Agreement enters into force for the depositing State or intergovernmental organization. 

Last updated: 6 September 2023