Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation: No hope without forests - Environmental Audit Committee Contents


Memorandum by The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA)

  1.  The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) is a UK-based non-governmental organisation. EIA is dedicated to exposing and combating environmental crime. Since its inception in 1984 it has pioneered investigative techniques to documents three major categories of environmental crime; illegal logging and trade in illicit timber, wildlife trafficking, and smuggling of environmentally-harmful chemicals.

  2.  EIA has spent 10 years documenting illegal logging and trade in stolen timber. This work has involved field investigations in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, China, Honduras, the US and European Union. In addition to investigations EIA has carried out comprehensive capacity building for local NGOs and communities across Indonesia. EIA has been involved in both the development of the EU's Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, and the recent amendment to the US Lacey Act which criminalises the importation and sale of illegally-logged timber and wood products.

  3.  EIA's unique experience of the illegal logging issue leaves it well placed to provide pertinent information to the inquiry. EIA will limit its submission to two elements of the inquiry:

    —  Government progress on tackling illegal timber since the EAC 2006 Report on sustainable timber.

    —  The success or otherwise of the EU FLEGT Action Plan, and Government support for it.

  4.  Illegal logging is recognised as a major global environmental problem. The World Bank estimates that illegal logging costs developing countries £7.5 billion a year through theft of public assets and non-payment of taxes. Illegal logging is a major driver of tropical deforestation; globally forest loss is the second biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions after the energy sector. Indonesia has the world's worst deforestation rate and at the beginning of the decade had an illegal logging rate of 80%. Such drastic forest loss led Indonesia to be ranked as the third biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in 2006. Illegal logging threatens biodiversity; recent data shows that almost 80% of primates in South-East Asia are threatened with extinction, and habitat loss is a major cause. In addition illegal logging robs rural communities of resources and livelihoods, and fosters corruption and weak governance.

  5.  Illegal logging in producer countries such as Indonesia is directly driven by demand for cheap wood products in major consumer markets like the EU and US. Yet efforts to curtail the worldwide trade in illegally-logged timber are continually undermined by the absence of a legal framework in importing countries to interdict shipments of illegally-logged timber. While progress has been made in combating illegal logging in some producer countries, notably Indonesia, the major consumers of wood products have failed to close their markets to illicit timber.

  6.  The exception is the US. In May 2008 the US government amended its Lacey Act, effectively outlawing the importation or sale of any timber or wood product which has been logged or transported in contravention of another country's laws. Penalties under the revised act range from confiscation of goods to a prison sentence, depending on the severity of the offence.

  7.  The EU has failed to implement market controls like those adopted in the US. Under its FLEGT Action Plan the EU envisaged two responses to the problem of illegal logging; Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPA) with producer countries and consideration of additional legislative options to control imports of illegally-logged timber.

  8.  The UK has been a major supporter of the VPA process, under which partner countries undertake to only supply timber verified legal to the EU market. EIA believes that VPAs represent a progressive policy solution to tackle illegal logging in producer countries. The VPA process has the potential to reform forest governance in producer countries. For instance in Indonesia the VPA consultation process to date has been transparent and inclusive, with unprecedented participation from civil society. EIA commends the UK government for its support of VPAs.

  9.  In terms of additional legislative options, the European Commission has repeatedly failed to produce a draft policy, as requested by the Council of Ministers. While the FLEGT Action Plan has been progressively tackling illegal logging in several producer countries under the VPA negotiations, it has manifestly failed to take the necessary measures to exclude illegally-logged timber from the EU market. Such a failure could undermine the effectiveness of VPAs; for instance if Indonesia signed such a VPA, the agreement could be circumvented simply by smuggling timber from Indonesia to China and then into the EU. Indonesia has expressly requested that the EU introduce a new regulation to ban imports of illegally-logged timber during VPA negotiations.

  10.  Within the EU, the UK is a major importer of illegally-logged timber and wood products. In 2006 it is estimated that the EU imported around £2 billion worth of illegally-sourced wood, with the UK importing 3.2 million cubic metres of stolen wood, worth around £700 million. In 2007 EIA published a briefing document called "Receiving Stolen Goods" calling for the UK to take unilateral action to halt such imports (copy supplied).

  11.  In its 2006 report the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) supported the notion of legislation at the UK level if the EU fails to act. The EAC report stated: If the government wants to be taken seriously on its commitment to help protect the world's forests it must introduce as a matter of urgency legislation to prevent illegal timber and timber products from entering the UK market." Two years later the EU has demonstrably failed to act, and the UK government has not brought forward legislation.

  12.  Meanwhile illegally-logged timber continues to flow into the UK. In September 2008 EIA carried out a random survey of retailers selling flooring made from merbau timber in the UK. Merbau is a luxurious tropical timber species only found in Indonesia, Malaysia and Papua New Guinea. Most remaining merbau on the island of New Guinea, which contains the last intact frontier forests in the Asia-Pacific region. EIA's investigations have revealed a high degree of illegality in the felling and trade of merbau. When EIA staff, posing as customers, called 16 retailers selling merbau flooring, not a single one could prove the legality of the merbau. In several cases the merbau was being sourced from known timber smugglers in Indonesia.

  13.  EIA believes that the time has come for the UK to demonstrate its commitment to protecting the world's dwindling rainforests by implementing legislation to outlaw the sale and distribution of illegally-sourced timber. A possible template for such legislation already exists in the form of a Private Member's Bill called the "Illegally Logged Timber (Prohibition of Sale and Distribution) Bill put forward by Barry Gardiner MP. The UK government should support the measures in this bill as a matter of urgency, and take steps to ensure that UK consumers are not unwitting accomplices to the crime of illegal logging.

  14.  EIA would be available to provide oral testimony to the inquiry is required.

10 October 2008





 
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