Let's support reforestation & careful use of papers!

Fight to save tropical rainforests of Sumatra

By Charles Clover, Environment Editor, in Jambi, Sumatra

Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 08/12/2007

Deep in the rainforest of Sumatra, an experiment is being conducted which could save the world's tropical forests from destruction. Eighty per cent of Sumatra's rich lowland forest is estimated to have been destroyed in the past 30 years Less than 900 miles from Bali, where United Nations talks on climate change are taking place, Sean Marron is taking on the illegal loggers whose activities are leading to a big increase the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Mr Marron is head of the Harapan Rainforest project, a logging concession bought by a conservation consortium involving Burung Indonesia, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and Birdlife International. Eighty per cent of Sumatra's rich lowland forest is estimated to have been destroyed in the past 30 years. Deforestation in Indonesia accounts for about two thirds of its greenhouse gas emissions, making it the world's third largest carbon dioxide polluter. Between 2000 and 2005, an area of forest equivalent to 300 soccer pitches was destroyed every hour. Harapan, which straddles the border of two provinces near Jambi in central Sumatra, is 250,000 acres, roughly the size of Greater London. It is the first logged concession to be taken over with the explicit aim of ecosystem restoration. Though made up of previously-logged forest, Harapan is unusually rich in wildlife, with gibbon monkeys and birds such as the Rufous bellied eagle and the Greater rocket-tailed drongo in abundance. The Sumatran tiger, Malaysian tapir, porcupines and elephants share the habitat. The cycle of destruction, which so far affects only Harapan's north east corner, is brutally simple. A failure of officialdom to enforce logging rules means too much timber is cut down. When timber companies move out, illegal loggers move in, often in collusion with illegal squatters. But while the forest is squandered, vast areas of degraded land go unused. "We have come here for a better livelihood and to change our destiny," said one man in a lavish new settlement illegally built on Harapan's land. "We are poor, the legal status of this land means nothing to us." Harapan had repeatedly asked the police to evict the squatters over the past two months. The police launched three raids in a week. Of an estimated 300 illegal loggers with chainsaws operating in the forest, 200 have gone. But an indication that the old ways are not over was the seizure by police of a lorryload of illegal timber last week. It was seized back at gunpoint by soldiers on the side of the loggers. Mr Marron still places his faith in a presence on the ground, rather than confrontation, and an insistence that enforcement must be done by the police. Harapan has only been going six months, but it is being talked about in Bali as a possible model for using billions of pounds generated in carbon credits paid by the rich North to fund the preservation of rainforests in the poor South. Mr Marron's Indonesian colleague, the head of operations, Muhammad Zubairin, said the survival of forests is not just a question of money. The former oil plantation manager said: "It all depends on whether there is good governance and alternative economic opportunities for local people." But he said corruption and land rights for the poor had to be tackled as well as climate change, or the vicious cycle of illegal logging would continue.

Against the grain

The fate of the rainforests is in our hands. Experts in tropical timber have concluded that developing countries lack either the will or the wherewithal to stop the onslaught which sees an area of rainforest the size of England destroyed each year.

The only hope, say conservationists, lies with the purchasing power of the rich countries in the north. If we insist on timber that is sustainably harvested it will put pressure on the loggers to ply their trade with greater care. Western governments must act much more swiftly. So must local government and business.

So must individual consumers. But as I discovered in a building project at my own home, putting conservation principles into practice is far from easy. For the past five months, my family has been enduring that living hell euphemistically known in the building trade as the kitchen extension. It will all be worthwhile when the builders have moved out and we are left in a stylish, modern space built with minimal environmental impact. The lightweight construction has highly-insulated walls and ultra-efficient glazing which passes the eco-test; but it fails with the timber.

My attention was focused on finding a set of patio doors that did not involve any rainforest destruction. My builder brother told me that, ideally, the doors should be made of hardwood which would not twist or swell. Local oak is out of my price range, so I resolved to buy doors made from tropical timber certified as being from a sustainably-managed forest.

The top timber certificate comes from the WWF-inspired Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), which claims to ensure that the timber has been cut in a way that protects the environment and safeguards the conditions of workers. I clicked on the FSC website and searched for patio doors. No mention of them. I phoned the FSC office in Llanidloes, Powys, and was referred back to the website. I phoned FSC timber merchants at random. There are very few of them. One had gone to Holland for a week. Another told me that he could not inform me about FSC timber without knowing the joinery specification. The joiner said he could not specify sizes without knowing the qualities of the timber.

Time was ticking on the building schedule. Another timber merchant from the FSC list told me he had stopped selling FSC timber because no one would buy it, even though he had priced it at the same level as regular timber. Builders did not recognise the types of wood in the yard, and architects had not specified it.

More on http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2001/nov/28/guardiansocietysupplement2

Be more paperless

Take a minute to look around the room you're in and notice how many things are made out of paper. There may be books, a few magazines, some printer paper, and perhaps a poster on the wall. Yet, if you consider that each person in the United States uses 749 pounds of paper every year (adding up to a whopping 187 billion pounds per year for the entire population, by far the largest per capita consumption rate of paper for any country in the world), then you realize that paper comes in many more forms than meets the eye.

The fact is, world consumption of paper has grown four hundred percent in the last 40 years. Now nearly 4 billion trees or 35% of the total trees cut around the world are used in paper industries on every continent. Besides what you can see around you, paper comes in many forms from tissue paper to cardboard packaging to stereo speakers to electrical plugs to home insulation to the sole inserts in your tennis shoes. In short, paper is everywhere.

More on http://www.ecology.com/feature-stories/paper-chase/index.html

News: Shadowy global timber trade that can worsen global warming

From Epoch Times in June 07, some news about the timber trade written by Reuters' reporter:

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From central Africa to the Amazon basin and Indonesia's islands, the world's great forests are being lost at an annual rate of at least 13 million hectares (32 million acres) an area the size of Greece or Nicaragua.

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Experts say few industries are as murky as the black market in wood.

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Chinese firms might not be chopping down the trees themselves, but their insatiable appetite is driving up prices, spurring loggers to open more tracks and drawing huge global investment to the companies.

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A 2-year investigation by Greenpeace accused companies mostly from Germany, Portugal, Belgium, Singapore and the US, of illegally acquiring titles to about 15 million hectares of Congolese rain forest after a 2002 moratorium.

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Once upon a time, wild animals would sometimes stroll right into a hunter's compound. "These days you don't see any. They don't fall into our traps anymore. You need to go very far, deep in the forest to see or catch one," a hunter tells Reuters. As usual, it is the poorest that pay.

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Many poor nations want the rich world to extend the Kyoto Protocol, the main UN plan for fighting global warming, to give farmers credits for letting forests stand rather than sell trees to loggers or clear land for crops.

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Spinning the glober further west, the problem is perhaps even more acute in Indonesia. Without drastic action, 98% of its remaining forests will be gone by 2022, with dire consequences for local people and wildlife, including endangered rhinos, tigers and orangutans. The government has deployed soldiers at least 3 times in recent years to confiscate wood and chase out loggers and is training quick response ranger teams to police protected areas. But experts say the new units are crippled by lack of funds, vehicles, weapons and equipment, and face a huge threat from loggers who are often guarded by heavily armed militia led by foreign mercenaries. "If cutting of trees continues, no forest will be left by 2022." a local environmental campaigner tells Reuters.

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The US and the EU the 2nd and 3rd biggest markets for Indonesian timber after China have both agreed in principle to ensure Indonesian forest product imports are verified as legal. But experts say the amount of investment in the logging companies from the industrialised world vastly outstrips donor efforts to help Jakarta. Trying to cut into the loggers' vast illicit profits, activists are fighting back with campaigns to persuade Western consumers to ask questions about where their wood comes from.