Vietnam 'hub for illegal timber'

BBC News 20 Mar 08;

Vietnam has become a major South-East Asian hub for processing illegally logged timber, according to a report from two environmental charities.

The trade threatens some of the last intact forests in the region, say the UK-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Indonesia's Telapak.

Because Vietnam has increased measures to protect its own forest, producers are getting timber from other nations. The authors add that some of the timber is reaching the UK as garden furniture.

"Over the last decade, governments around the world have made a raft of pronouncements regarding the seriousness of illegal logging and their determination to tackle it," the authors of the Borderlines report say.



"Yet the stark reality is 'business as usual' for the organised syndicates looting the remaining precious tropical forests for a quick profit."

The report says that an increase in the price of raw timber has prompted some wood producing countries, such as Indonesia, to take steps to combat illegal logging.

But, they explain, as tougher measures were enforced by one country, the problem shifts to another.

Uncertain future

EIA and Telapak say they have gathered evidence that "Vietnam is now exploiting the forests of neighbouring Laos to obtain valuable hardwoods for its outdoor furniture industry", which contravenes Laotian laws banning the export of logs and sawn timber.

They add that they also obtained evidence that timber traders from Thailand and Singapore were also securing raw materials from Laos.

The researchers who compiled the report said they met a Thai businessman who openly admitted paying bribes to secure a consignment of timber with a potential value of half a billion dollars.

"The cost of such unfettered greed is borne by rural communities in Laos who are dependent on the forests for their traditional livelihoods," said EIA's head of forest campaigns, Julian Newman.

"They gain virtually nothing from this trade; instead, the money goes to corrupt officials in Laos and businesses in Vietnam and Thailand."

The authors estimate there are about 1,500 wood processing enterprises in Vietnam with a total processing capacity of more than 2.5m cubic metres of logs a year. They believe outdoor furniture accounts for about 90% of the country's total wood exports.

Although the Vietnamese government has been tightening controls on logging since the early 1990s, it is also encouraging the wooden furniture industry to expand.

EIA said the nation had relaxed regulations concerning ownership in order to facilitate foreign investment, and it was also actively promoting the sector in overseas markets.

Mixed message

The groups said that ultimate responsibility had to rest with western markets that imported products made from the uncertified timber.

"To some extent, the dynamic growth of Vietnam's furniture industry is driven by the demand of end markets such as the European Union and US," the report concludes.

"Until these states clean up their act and shut their markets to wood products made from illegal timber, the loss of precious tropical forests will continue unabated."

The team found that many leading brands and retailers had "taken the necessary steps" to ensure that certified and legal timber was used in products they sourced from Vietnamese producers.

But researchers, posing as furniture buyers, found that a number of companies operating in the UK had failed to take the appropriate measures to ensure illegal timber was not entering the country.

Stemming the flow

In an effort to prevent illegal timber entering its borders, the EU developed an initiative called Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (Flegt) in 2003, aimed at forming partnerships with timber producing countries.

The scheme is underpinned by Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs), which involve establishing a certification system to ensure only legally sourced timber enters EU markets.

Malaysia began negotiations in 2006 to establish a VPA, and Indonesia embarked on a similar process in 2007.

EIA says the system focuses on direct shipments from the country, and does not take into account the fact that raw timber can pass through several countries, eg from Laos into Vietnam.

"Another problem with VPAs is that end products such as furniture are currently not included on the list of timber categories to be controlled," the report says.

Gareth Thomas, the UK's International Trade and Development Minister, said the report raised a number of concerns.

"Through the EU, we will be raising this with the Vietnamese government. I personally will be raising this with my Vietnamese counterpart," he told BBC News.

"We will explore with G8 colleagues whether there is G8 action we can take in this area."

Illegal logs from Laos fuel Mekong region's furniture industry
Nirmal Ghosh, Straits Times 22 Mar 08;

Huge volumes of hardwood trees being felled in a graft-riddled trade

BANGKOK - A NEW report and undercover film by the Britain-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Jakarta-based Telapak have revealed how Laos' forests are being felled illegally to supply the thriving furniture industry in Vietnam and Thailand - and in turn the West.

Officially, Laos bans the export of logs.

But footage filmed late last year and released this week in Bangkok shows dozens of big trucks laden with timber churning up dusty border roads to deliver logs from Laos to Vietnam.

EIA and Telapak - both independent non-government environmental organisations - estimated that at least 500,000 cubic m of freshly cut Laotian timber moves into Vietnam every year.

Vietnam's furniture industry has boomed tenfold since 2000, accounting for exports worth US$2.4 billion (S$3.3 billion) last year, mostly to Europe and the USA.

Since Vietnam began protecting its own forests in the late 1990s, more timber has been sourced, mostly illegally, from overseas including Indonesia and Cambodia - and now Laos.

The hardwoods yellow balau and keruin, are very much in demand.

At one importer and furniture-maker's factory in Vietnam, a staff explained: 'In Laos every year, the government allows cutting of 20,000 cubic m, but actually they cut two million cubic m.'

Sellers and buyers both routinely overlook discrepancies between the real volumes and the paperwork accompanying consignments.

China and Thailand also import logs illegally from Laos, according to the report by Telapak and EIA.

They secretly filmed a Thai importer who said he had paid a bribe of 'more than 10 million baht' (S$440,000) to a 'highranking' Lao government official for a 10-year logging concession in Laos, worth around half a billion US dollars.

'I pay government people...I pay at every step,' he said, his words caught on the hidden camera.

He added that he could clear the entire area in two years if necessary, though it would take longer to sell all the timber.

Between 1990 and 1995, the Mekong countries - Vietnam, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia - showed the highest rate of deforestation in the Asia-Pacific region, severely affecting the river itself.

In their report, Telapak and EIA noted that while the overall rate of deforestation had slowed since, figures for the Mekong countries showed continuing forest loss at a rate among the worst in the world.

'Between 2000 and 2005, Vietnam lost 51 per cent of its remaining primary forests...while Cambodia lost 29 per cent. It is evident that logging and land clearance continue to strip the last forests of the Mekong,' read the report.

The report, which also lists offending companies as well as importers in the West in detail, notes: 'In terms of timber trade, the Mekong countries are characterised by complex patronage relationships and corruption, a willingness to exploit neighbours' forest resources while protecting domestic forests, and a system of confusing and poorly enforced laws.'

The illegal logging continues despite a welter of regional agreements on protection and sustainable management of forests.

Much of the responsibility also rests on the demand side - retailers in countries like the United States, Japan, Britain, France and Germany, who often mislead the few consumers who care to ask about the origin of their furniture.