Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 7 • Number 8 • 27th April 2007
GREENPEACE: RESTRICT TRADE IN ENDANGERED MERBAU WOOD
GREENPEACE: RESTRICT TRADE IN ENDANGERED MERBAU WOOD
Environmental organisation Greenpeace recently released a report showcasing the illegal and unsustainable logging of merbau, a tropical hardwood species used to produce luxury flooring and outdoor furniture. Merbau remains in commercial quantities only on New Guinea (both in the Indonesian province of Papua and in Papua New Guinea). It is imported in large volumes by China, which processes it both for its domestic market and for export to the US, Europe, Australia and other countries.
According to new the report "most large international flooring producers include merbau in their product ranges, with the majority of them sourcing the wood from untraceable sources in Indonesia. Few, if any of these producers are able to credibly prove the full legal origins of their merbau supply." Merbau is on the IUCN red list of endangered species, categorised as "facing a high risk of extinction in the wild in the near future."
Entitled "Merbau’s last stand: How industrial logging is driving the destruction of the Paradise Forests of Asia Pacific," the Greenpeace report notes that if current rates of legal logging continue, merbau will be extinct in 35 years (and even more rapidly, when illegal logging is factored in). The tree takes up to 80 years to mature, and there are only a few merbau trees per hectare of forest. When merbau is felled, the entire forest area is degraded, even if the other trees are not targeted for timber.
The study, which factors in previous work undertaken by the Environmental Investigation Agency and its Indonesian partner Telapak, highlights several routes that criminal organisations are using to smuggle the merbau for processing in China. One method involves using forged Malaysian documents; another buying from illegal operators in Papua New Guinea. Further, logs are openly exported from Indonesia to China despite an Indonesian export ban for logs put in place in 2001. Logs are also exported as "sawn timber" - meaning some value-added would have been produced in Indonesia prior to their export. However, in practice, this sawn timber actually consists of minimally processed "squared logs." The newest smuggling route involves shipping the logs via Malaysia, where the get stamped as originating in Malaysia.
According to the World Bank, illegal logging of timber on public lands in developing countries generates losses in assets and revenue of more than US$10 billion each year. This amounts to more than six times the total official development assistance for sustainable management of forests.
The Greenpeace study makes several suggestions for how to address the problem. International and bilateral cooperation to resolve the problem should be strengthened, according to the organisation, and the countries that have merbau should engage in participatory planning activities aiming to create networks of protected areas. In addition, companies selling merbau products should adopt credible third-party chain-of-custody procedures. Further, Greenpeace suggests that Indonesia and Papua New Guinea seek to list merbau on Appendix III of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), following the route taken with regard to mahogany and ramin. Once on Appendix III, quotas severely restricting the trade in merbau would be set.
The next Conference of the Parties of the CITES convention will be held from 3-15 June in the Hague, the Netherlands.
Additional resources
The Greenpeace report "Merbau’s last stand: How industrial logging is driving the destruction of the Paradise Forests of Asia Pacific" is available at http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/media/reports/merbaus-last-stand.
The report by the Environmental Investigation Agency and Telapak "Behind the Veneer: HowIndonesia’s Last Rainforests are Being Felled for Flooring" from March 2006, is available at http://www.eia-international.org/cgi/reports/reports.cgi?t=template&a=117.
The update to "Behind the Veneer," from October 2006, is available at http://www.eia-international.org/files/reports121-1.pdf.
"Video hints at China’s illicit trade in tropical lumber," GLOBE AND MAIL, 18 April 2007; "’Gold rush’ for wood flooring is destroying endangered habitat," THE INDEPENDENT, 17 April 2007; "Greenpeace Says China Guilty in Illegal Logging," REUTERS, 17 April 2007.