Chilean Native Forests Dwindle
4/22/96
OVERVIEW, SOURCE & COMMENTARY by EE
The cool beech forests of Tierra del Fuego, Chile, are owned by a U.S.
company, Trillium Corp, who plans to harvest these ancient beech trees.
Native forests have been heavily harvested in Chile, and given such a high
rate of past industrial forestry, environmentalists are skeptical of
promises for sustainable management. Reuters reports that 80 percent of
Chile's 17.5 million acres of native forests are in private hands, and that
this timber deal will set an important precedent. Discussion is made of
the movement to "green-label" wood products. It is my opinion that "green"
timber involves not only less harvest per unit area; but smaller scale,
locally owned forestry operations rather then continued large scale foreign
owned companies.
g.b.
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Chilean native forests dwindle as debate rages
4/17/96
Copyright 1996 by Reuters
PORVENIR, Chile (Reuter) - Centuries old and thriving in one of the most
remote spots on earth, the cool beech forests of Tierra del Fuego's
southern slopes have been barely touched by time -- until now.
Padlocked gates, wire fences and a newly built wide dirt track leading into
the trees are signs that changes are taking place in these vast, far-flung
woodlands.
The forests are owned by the U.S. company Trillium Corp., whose plans to
exploit the ancient beech trees have become the latest battleground between
the lumber industry and ecologists over Chile's dwindling native forests.
What makes this controversy different from Chile's many environmental
horror stories is that Trillium insists its project is different -- that it
will cull mature trees, not clear-cut them, and that its plan will
"improve" the forest in a model of sustainable development.
Chile's growing environmental movement is skeptical.
"I look with great alarm at the growth of forestry activity in this
country," said Manuel Baquedano, director of the Political Ecology
Institute in Santiago.
"Native forests have been practically exhausted in central Chile from a
commercial point of view. The frontier of exploitation has now moved much
further south."
Baquedano fears that exploitation of Tierra del Fuego's woodlands could one
day leave the area like central Chile, where decades of logging and burning
have reduced once vast stands of larch and redwood to isolated pockets.
With 80 percent of Chile's 17.5 million acres of native forests in private
hands, much will depend on the actions of companies like Trillium.
Trillium, based in Bellingham, Wash., plans to start this year logging and
managing the some 740,000 acres of forest it owns on Tierra del Fuego, an
island shared between Chile and Argentina. The woods are made up mainly of
two species of beech known as lenga and coigue.
Unlike most Chilean forestry projects, which involve wholesale cutting and
burning without replanting, the lenga scheme will be sustainable, Trillium
officials said.
"The forest is highly regenerative and so when you open it up and light
comes in, smaller trees will grow," said Ron Packard, general manager of
Trillium's Chilean division. "It's a sustainable model based on
conservative growth assumptions."
Lenga, which can live more than 500 years, is valued for its deep pink
wood, which closely resembles timber from the valuable North American
cherry tree.
Ecologists say more research needs to be done into the forest's fragile
ecosystem before any management can begin.
"No one knows how the ecosystem works. The real problem is no one worries
about this before they start cutting. It's like running in the dark," said
Bedrich Magas, a professor of electrical engineering at Magallanes
University and local environmentalist in Punta Arenas, the regional
capital.
Trillium, which has invested $15 million studying lenga and has hired teams
of scientists to help prepare the project, hopes its care in setting it up
will pay -- literally.
Eager to take advantage of the growing fashionability and higher prices for
"green-label" wood products, the company will apply for certification that
the lenga has been logged under tough environmental standards, officials
said.
But a report commissioned by the government last year from France's state
forestry agency to have lenga exports certified as coming from well-run
woodlands slammed Chilean forestry management techniques and was scathing
about Trillium.
"Chilean foresters are short-sighted," said the report. "Their attitude is
equivalent to treating a forest like a mine, which is abandoned when the
vein is exhausted."
Trillium was carrying out "a huge industrial investment without worrying
whether the forest can support it in a sustainable way," the study said.
But company executives said the report was based on inaccurate information.
A study last year from Chile's Central Bank said that if current
destruction continues there could be virtually no mature native forest left
in Chile within 30 years, apart from that protected in national parks. Most
seriously affected has been the central Sixth Region where between 40 and
60 percent of native forest has been cleared since 1984, it said.
Felling has soared in the last 10 years as firms clear woods for replanting
with fast-growing pine and eucalyptus, both imported species. Native lumber
is made into wood chips with most exports going to Japan's voracious paper
industry.