Cambodia: Stop Logging Now or No Forests Will Be Left

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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org

http://forests.org/ -- Forest Conservation Archives

http://forests.org/web/ -- Discuss Forest Conservation

1/11/00

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY

We reported late last year that the group Global Witness, long a

critic of Cambodian forest policy, had been retained by the

government to monitor the forest industry. They appear to be wasting

no time in making necessary hard prescriptions of what it will take to

maintain forests in the long run. They have called for a halt to all

logging and the cancellation of more than half of existing contracts.

The second article highlights the possible resurgence of military

backed illegal logging operations. The Cambodian timber boom, like

those before it, is so immense and out of control that only strong and

immediate action will lead to any chance of continued forest ecosystem

benefits; and the potential for a properly scaled, ecologically

sustainable timber industry in the future.

g.b.

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ITEM #1

Title: Stop logging now or forests have seven years left, warns

watchdog

Source: South China Morning Post

Date: January 7, 2000

An environmental watchdog that monitors forestry reforms has called

for an immediate halt to all logging and the cancellation of more than

half of the existing logging contracts.

London-based Global Witness said in a report that 11 of Cambodia's 21

legal timber companies had engaged in illegal practices, including

cutting in national forests and threatening villagers with violence.

Five years ago Cambodia possessed vast, pristine forests. It now has

4.7 million hectares of forest under logging concessions, and Global

Witness says the rate is increasing too quickly to be sustainable.

Environmentalists predict the forests will be "logged out" within five

to seven years.

Three companies had already stripped their allotted forests bare, said

Global Witness.

The watchdog recommended Cambodia's Government stop all logging

activities, even in legal concessions, until an Asian Development Bank

(ADB) review was complete.

It also said at least 12 timber companies should be thrown out for

overexploiting the forests.

"The concession review is a wonderful opportunity to rid Cambodia of

the worst offenders once and for all. But whether the Royal Government

of Cambodia makes use of this opportunity is another matter," said

Patrick Alley, Global Witness co-director.

Deputy Forestry Director Chea Sam Ang said he would study the

recommendations of Global Witness but probably would not take action

until the other study funded by the ADB was completed in June or July.

"It depends on the ADB, not Global Witness," he said.

Global Witness has for years railed against uncontrolled logging in

Cambodia, saying it threatens the environment with erosion and could

lead to famine.

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy seized on the report's findings to call

on international donors to suspend direct assistance to the Government

unless more is done to halt deforestation.

"Donor countries have now to open their eyes [and] stop being

accomplices to the extremely corrupt Phnom Penh government," Mr Sam

Rainsy said.

Prime Minister Hun Sen's Government successfully slowed unlicensed

cutting to a trickle after pressure from international donor nations

and agencies.

Donors had threatened to halt aid unless Cambodia reined in the off-

the-books logging, which also deprives the Government in the short

term of nearly US$100 million (HK$777 million) in fees every year.

The Government promised the ADB it would restrict licensed logging to

levels that were sustainable. Global Witness was last month named the

main monitor to the agreement.

ITEM #2

Title: Cambodia logging probe ordered

Source: By Associated Press

Date: January 9, 2000

Cambodia's prime minister has ordered an investigation into alleged

involvement in illegal logging by a governor and the army in a remote

northeastern province.

Ty Sokun, director of the Forestry Department, confirmed today that

investigators were trying to determine how many people were involved,

up to the level of the provincial governor, in the cutting and

smuggling operations.

The order by Prime Minister Hun Sen follows a military report that

there has been a resurgence in illegal logging in Mondulkiri province

despite the government's recent campaign to preserve Cambodia's

diminishing forests.

Hun Sen wrote in the margins of the report, obtained today by The

Associated Press, that the investigation "must dig into the roots,

with no one being spared with any mercy."

"They must be met with disciplinary measures, fired, demoted or sued

in a court of law," he wrote.

The report, prepared by a military task force that recently inspected

a logging area near Vietnam, said that about 380 truckloads of timber

were transported across the border in November and December.

New roads have been paved to allow access for logging equipment and

for newly cut trees to be exported, according to the report.

The report also accused the province's governor, Chhaom Bunkhan,

police and military police chiefs of "conspiring with crooked

businessmen" to log the area, rich in high quality wood.

Phone lines to Mondulkiri seldom work, and it was impossible to reach

the province's governor today.

Cambodia's timber trade spun out of control in the early 1990s as

corrupt officials and the army facilitated exports of lumber.

A year after consolidating his power in 1998 elections, Hun Sen has

begun a crackdown on illegal logging that a British environmental

group, Global Witness, has called extremely effective.

The crackdown was strongly urged by international donors that

contribute nearly half of Cambodia's national budget.

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