Brief 1: Unpacking the Diversity of Micro-, Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises
Little and Legal: Micro-, Small-, and Medium-Sized Enterprises (MSMEs) within the Emerging Timber Legality Paradigm
By Andrea Johnson - CATIE-Finnfor View PublicationThis series of briefs attempts to contribute greater clarity to the debate by disaggregating the diversity of micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMES) and providing a conceptual starting point for more coherent dialogues and targeted, impactful policy and research design. It encompasses the diversity of MSMEs because the globalized reach of many wood product supply chains, and the rapid increase of South-South trade flows, obscure the lines between local and international trade. Further, all but one Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) signed to date in Africa and Asia include the aspirational goal of achieving legality in domestic trade as well, making national markets a necessary part of the discussion. Brief 1 outlines the breadth of MSMEs and suggests a typology for differentiating among them with greater precision. This more nuanced picture helps us to recognize certain invisibilities – blind spots that impede or bias the way in which MSMEs are discussed by decision-makers – and identify new points of entry for MSMEs in legal supply chains and better policy-making in the context of national VPA processes.