Green Corruption

Corruption in the timber value chain is a major challenge for environmental sustainability and governance in Latin America.

This report presents the application of a corruption risk management approach by environmental authorities in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru, implemented through technical assistance from the Basel Institute on Governance’s Green Corruption programme.

Key corruption risks

The report describes the main corruption risks identified in collaboration with five environmental authorities responsible for integrity in the timber value chain, covering:

• The granting of forestry rights
• The issuance and use of timber transport waybills
• The control and supervision of authorised actors.

The main corruption risks identified involve:

• Improper agreements between public servants and third parties
• Abuse of authority
• Undue influence or pressure from superiors

Mitigation measures

Planned mitigation measures fall into four main categories:

• Regulatory improvements, including updating procedures, closing implementation gaps and improving efficiency
• Strengthened supervision, such as file tracking systems and alerts to reduce discretion
• Enhanced communication, including multicultural approaches for Indigenous and rural communities
• Cross-cutting measures to promote integrity such as awareness-raising, ethical reflection and training

Given common patterns across natural resource sectors, these measures may be relevant for other environmental agencies, though they should be adapted to local contexts.

Lessons learned

The experiences in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru highlight the importance of tailoring risk management approaches to national contexts, ensuring institutional leadership and fostering inter-institutional collaboration. They also underline the value of peer learning and cross-border exchange.

This Case Study demonstrates how international cooperation and the follow-the-money approach revealed a transnational criminal network trafficking endangered species and led to Madagascar’s first money laundering conviction related to wildlife trafficking.

About this Case Study

This publication is part of the Basel Institute on Governance Case Study series, ISSN 2813-3900. It is licensed for sharing under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).

Photo: Studio Sifaka / khaosodenglish (used with permission).

The Case Study series offers practitioners insights into interesting and precedent-setting cases involving corruption and asset recovery. This case relates to the Basel Institute’s Green Corruption programme.

The development of this publication was funded through the Illegal Wildlife Trade (IWT) Challenge Fund.

The contents are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Basel Institute on Governance, its donors and partners, or the University of Basel.

This U4 Issue analyses Indonesia’s ambitious energy transition and highlights how political finance, weak regulations and a “revolving door” of personnel between public office and the private sector create vulnerabilities. The publication was produced by U4 and the Basel Institute on Governance through its Green Corruption programme.

About the paper

Conflicts of interest and corruption in Indonesia’s political economy pose significant risks to its energy transition, including the Just Energy Transition Partnership. Existing legal and institutional frameworks are fragmented, inconsistently applied, and often fail to address the risk of state capture by powerful political and economic actors, especially in the extractive and energy sectors.

The reliance on fossil fuel industries for political financing and the monopolistic nature of state-owned entities further complicate the shift to a low- or no-carbon system, despite the country’s ambitious renewable energy targets.

Potential pathways to greater anti-corruption resilience lie in improvements to beneficial ownership transparency and strengthening regulation, monitoring and sanctioning of conflict of interest violations.

At the 8th session of the Conference of the States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), in December 2019, States Parties adopted a resolution recognising the relationship between corruption and environmental crimes.

Resolution 8/12 – Preventing and combating corruption as it relates to crimes that have an impact on the environment – is a landmark Resolution. With its 23 operative paragraphs (OPs), it underlies the importance of addressing corruption linked to crimes that have an impact on the environment. It urges States Parties to prevent, investigate and prosecute corruption offences where they may be linked to crimes that have an impact on the environment.

Saplings of hope presents an updated overview of emerging and promising prevention and enforcement actions, initiatives and measures implemented by UNCAC States Parties to combat corruption as it pertains to crimes that have an impact on the environment. It focuses specifically on initiatives from 2024 and 2025.

The Working Paper also underscores the valuable contributions made by non-state actors, in particular civil society, academia and the media, in this collective endeavour.

Finally, it makes the case for a paradigm shift, moving from “corruption as it relates to crimes that have an impact on the environment” to “corruption that has an impact on the environment”. The shift is necessary, because corruption can harm the environment without being linked to a crime that has an impact on the environment. Section 5 thus explores two interconnected issues which have a devastating impact on the environment: corruption linked to climate finance and renewable energy as well as corruption tied to the exploitation of critical minerals.

About this Working Paper

This report is part of the Green Corruption programme at the Basel Institute on Governance and was prepared in the context of the 11th Conference of the States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption in Doha, Qatar, from 14–19 December 2025.

It provides an update to Working Paper 50, 'Seedlings of hope: Addressing corruption linked to crimes that impact the environment in line with UNCAC Resolution 8/12’, which was prepared in the context of CoSP10 in Atlanta, Georgia, US in 2023.

The report is part of the Basel Institute on Governance Working Paper Series, ISSN: 2624-9650. It is a Diamond Open Access publication, also hosted on the Basel University Library’s open publishing platform eterna as part of our Basel Institute on Governance Working Paper Journal, with DOI: 10.12685/bigwp.2025.61.1-65.

You may share or republish the report under a Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence.

It was made possible by the generous support of the Principality of Liechtenstein.

The contents are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Basel Institute on Governance, its donors and partners, or the University of Basel.

This Case Study highlights how investigators of Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment and Forestry achieved their first conviction for money laundering linked to forestry offences, leveraging institutional and legal changes in financial investigation procedures.

About this Case Study

This publication is part of the Basel Institute on Governance Case Study series, ISSN 2813-3900. It is licensed for sharing under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

The development of this publication was funded through the Illegal Wildlife Trade (IWT) Challenge Fund.

The contents are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Basel Institute on Governance, its donors and partners, or the University of Basel.