Nat-Geo: U.S. Major Importer of Illegal Asian Timber, Study Says

[Guest guest]

Link:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/05/080513-asia-logging_2.html

U.S. Major Importer of Illegal Asian Timber, Study Says Stefan Lovgren

for National Geographic News <http://news.nationalgeographic.com/>

May 13, 2008

 

Vietnam<http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/countries/country_vietnam.html\

>has

become a hub for processing Asia's illegally logged timber, much of

which is sold in the United States as outdoor furniture, conservationists

say.

In a report released in March, the U.K.-based nonprofit Environmental

Investigation Agency (EIA) and its Indonesian partner Telapak warned that

the illegal timber trade is threatening some of the last intact forests in

Southeast Asia, especially in

Laos<http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/countries/country_laos.html>

..

 

" Despite wide awareness of the problem of illegal logging and a series of

political commitments to tackle the issue, demand for cut-price wood

products is still fuelling the illegal destruction of some of the worlds

most significant remaining tropical forests, " said Julian Newman, head of

the EIA's forest campaign program.

 

It is currently legal in the United States to import illegally sourced wood

products. But legislation now under consideration in the U.S. Congress would

ban imports of wood products derived from illegally harvested timber.

 

*Endangered Species at Greater Risk*

 

EIA estimates that the illegal logging business, which the agency says is

orchestrated by cross-border criminal syndicates working with corrupt

officials, costs developing countries some 10 billion to 15 billion U.S.

dollars a year.

 

A rise in timber prices has prompted some wood-producing countries, such as

Indonesia<http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/countries/country_indonesia.\

html>,

to clamp down on illegal logging.

 

Other countries, such as

China<http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/places/countries/country_china.html>and

Vietnam, have taken measures to sharply reduce all logging of their

own

forests, while importing timber from neighboring countries for their growing

timber-processing industries.

 

Around 60 percent of the trade in tropical timber moves between the

countries of southern and eastern Asia, according to EIA.

 

" One of the biggest shifts in the timber industry in Asia over the last

decade or so has been the emergence of a huge wood-processing industry in

China and Vietnam, " said Newman.

 

The Mekong region—which includes Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Myanmar

(Burma), and China—has some of the most valuable and vulnerable tree species

sought by the international timber trade, including rosewood, keruing, teak,

and yellow balau.

 

Mekong forests are also home to a range of endangered animals, including the

clouded

leopard<http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/clouded-leopard.ht\

ml>,

tiger, and Malayan sun bear.

 

Many of the remaining forests in the region have been so heavily logged that

they are now of critically low quality. In Laos, for example, only around 10

percent of forests remain commercially viable, according to the report.

 

*Undercover Investigations*

 

In Vietnam logging is restricted to 5.3 million cubic feet (150,000 cubic

meters) from forests grown for timber production.

 

To satisfy its demand for raw products, Vietnam is exploiting the forests of

neighboring Laos despite Laotian laws, which ban the export of logs and cut

timber, the EIA report claims.

 

(Related news: " Vietnam Becoming Asia's Illegal Animal 'Supermarket,'

Experts

Warn " <http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/09/060913-vietnam-wildlife.ht\

ml>[september

13, 2006].)

 

In the Vietnamese port of Vinh, undercover investigators found piles of huge

logs from Laos awaiting sale.

 

At one border crossing 45 trucks carrying logs were seen lining up on the

Laos side waiting to cross into Vietnam.

 

The agencies estimate that at least 17.7 million cubic feet (500,000 cubic

meters) of logs move illegally from Laos to Vietnam every year.

 

" This trade is organized by informal networks involving timber brokers and

government and military officials on both sides of the border, " Newman said.

 

 

" The losers are the rural communities [in Laos] who traditionally rely on

forests for their livelihood. "

 

According to the Laotian government, forest cover in the country has

declined from 70 percent in the 1970s to 40 percent today.

 

Large volumes of timber from Laos also go to China's burgeoning

wood-processing industry, researchers say.

 

Jeff Hayward is the verification manager of the SmartWood Program for the

Rainforest Alliance in Washington, D.C.

 

" The EIA study illustrates the ways and means for illicit timber to end up

in the workshops of Vietnam, resulting in consumers [in Europe and the

United States] unwittingly buying furniture that comes at the cost of

forests in Laos and Cambodia, " he said.

 

*New Legislation*

 

Vietnam's furniture exports reached U.S. $2.4 billion in 2007, a ten-fold

increase since 2000.

 

The United States is by far the largest market for Vietnamese wooden

furniture, accounting for almost 40 percent of the exports.

 

" Illegal logging and trade are rife, but most businesses don't ask hard

questions about the source of the wood they buy, because they simply don't

have to do so, " said Andrea Johnson, the forest campaigns coordinator for

EIA in Washington, D.C.

 

" Until consumer markets like the U.S. change their no-questions-asked

policy, irreplaceable forests from Indonesia to Vietnam to Honduras to the

Congo are going to continue to end up as dining room tables and porch

swings. "

 

The U.S. legislation being considered prohibits the import or trade of

illegally sourced timber and wood products.

 

The bill has broad political support and is backed by virtually all major

environmental organizations and the U.S. timber industry.

 

Illegal logging costs U.S. companies as much as a billion U.S. dollars a

year in lost exports and reduces prices for timber products, according to

the American Forest and Paper Association.

 

" This law will send a major signal to the global timber sector that the

world's largest consumer market is closing its doors to illegal wood, "

Johnson said.

 

" Companies who source on the up-and-up and conduct strong due diligence will

now be rewarded with market share rather than undercut by cheaper illegal

products. "

 

 

--

United against elephant polo

http://www.stopelephantpolo.com