5. Next steps and timetable

1. Approval and Dissemination of the Evaluation Guide: The guide will be reviewed jointly by MECNEF and another ministry involved in the process, for final approval and dissemination. This phase could be completed by the last week of April or first week of May.

2. Evaluation of Conversion requests – Documentary Review. Following the approval of the guide, the TWG will complete the documentary evaluation of the request for conversion files. This documentary analysis will take approximately two months of work.
   

3. Evaluation of Conversion requests – Field Verification. Only the titles that were deemed administratively receivable and legally valid by the technical working group will be the object of field verification. The objective of these field verifications will be, in general, to validate the business plans, in particular to try to identify existing and potential social conflicts involving the potential allocation of a forest concession. Depending on the number of titles to verify and the logistical constraints, this phase could take from one to three months to complete.

4. Work of the Inter-ministerial Commission. After the completion of the field verifications, the TWG will submit its report to the Inter-ministerial Commission. As laid out in the Decree PD 50/116, the Commission has 45 days to complete its work. It is however difficult at the present time to predict the timing and duration of this phase.

The Independent Expert will closely monitor and regularly report on all of the above phases.

6. Respect of the timeframe prescribed by the decree

As we can see from the previous point, it is impossible to respect the timetable imposed by the decree. In effect, not withstanding the delay in the start of the process, unavoidable technical constraints due to the large number of requests to evaluate, the complexity of the business plans, and difficulties associated with field verification, make it impossible to respect the timetable prescribed by the Decree.

7. Additional work to take into account the social dimension and rights of local populations adjacent to forest concessions

It is apparent that the four months permitted for the evaluation of conversion requests will not be sufficient, with the means initially allocated to the TWG and Independent Expert, to evaluate the effective inclusion of local populations in the process. The Independent Expert recommended to the Government of DRC and various international donors that, because of the limited funds and the difficulties associated with public consultation, additional funds be mobilized to strengthen these aspects of the conversion process.