PRESS RELEASE

WORLDWIDE RAINFOREST CONSERVATION NETWORK SLAMS WORLD BANK'S PAPUA

NEW GUINEA PROGRAM

World Bank Makes Public Its Abandonment of Logging Moratorium and

Community Based Eco-Forestry

Forests.org, Inc. Joins in Calls for World Bank to Reform Its

Policies in Papua New Guinea or Leave the Country

By Forests.org, Inc. < http://forests.org >

For Immediate Release: July 1, 2001

Contact: Glen Barry, Forests.org, Inc. +1 608 288 8102

Forests.org, Inc. and its network of thousands of forest

conservationists worldwide have expressed solidarity with Papua New

Guinea (PNG) students protesting the World Bank's policies in PNG.

The World Bank recently made public its decision to allow a

moratorium on new rainforest logging in Papua New Guinea to lapse.

The World Bank has also confirmed it has abandoned support for

policy-making in support of community-based eco-forestry. Instead,

in a response to a concerted campaign by conservation NGOs, they

continue to state failed platitudes regarding once again "reforming"

the industrial log export industry (see full text of documents at

http://forests.org/pngforest.html, on right).

For many years the World Bank has courted environmental and other

non-governmental organizations; gaining support for their PNG program

on the basis of commitments to protect PNG's rainforests. Their

sudden reversal on maintaining the logging moratorium and withdrawal

of backing for community based eco-forestry policy-making will lead

to widespread withdrawal of this support.

Additional concerns are being raised in country regarding World Bank

sponsored privatization of PNG's national assets, and subtle

pressures to move towards registration and eventual privatization of

clan owned customary lands. Last week rioting police killed several

PNG students that were peacefully protesting against these policies.

Forests.org, Inc. joins with protestors, including those killed

defending their country's independence, in demanding that the World

Bank and International Monetary Fund reform their policies in Papua

New Guinea - or leave the country.

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND

The present forest allocation process in PNG remains biased towards

large-scale intensive management for log export by foreign companies

- with huge environmental costs and few national benefits. After

over 12 years of World Bank sponsored reform, the PNG forest sector

remains a quagmire of corruption, deceit and violence.

Conditions attached to a $90 million structural adjustment loan in

1999 require PNG to maintain a moratorium on new logging concessions

until a full review of all concessions was carried out, and

appropriate reforms implemented.

The Bank's abandonment of the moratorium as a condition for lending

effectively gives the green light to development by foreign companies

of some 30 proposed timber projects - most of PNG's remaining large

forest expanses. PNG's rainforests constitute the third largest

contiguous rainforest in the World.

Local conservationists had demanded that the moratorium remain in

force until adequate policies have been designed and implemented to

legitimize and make fully accessible small-scale eco-forestry

management, and establishment of clan based conservation areas. The

government is yet to fully recognize such non-industrial forest uses.

RAINFOREST CONSERVATIONIST'S DEMANDS

Forests.org, Inc., in conjunction with thousands of active forest

conservationists around the World, call upon the World Bank to honor

its commitment to maintain the logging moratorium as a condition for

further lending; and to reformulate with the PNG government its

proposed forestry project to emphasize transitioning the industry

from industrial log export to community based eco-forestry and

protected areas.

Further, Forests.org demands the following from the Government of

PNG, the World Bank and the Government of Australia (a major donor):

* Establish a Commission of Inquiry with broad discretionary power to

investigate all aspects of the logging industry and make necessary

recommendations, including possible criminal prosecutions.

* Establish a timeline to permanently end industrial log exports, and

a process to transition the industry to small and medium scaled

community and certified forest management.

* End donor subsidies to industrial log export. Redirect donor funds

to transitioning the industry to sustainability and community based

production and protection, cushioning the economic impact upon the

government and landowners of doing so.

Should the World Bank prove unwilling to pursue such rigorous

rainforest conservation policy-making; they should leave PNG.

Maintenance of forests as a long-term social and economic guarantee

of security for PNG's landowners was one of the only redeeming

qualities of the World Bank PNG program. In sum, aggressive

privatization of governmental assets, rainforests and clan owned

lands is intolerable; and against the norms of PNG society, and

requirements for national and global ecological sustainability.

The World Bank is nearing completion of a new global forestry policy

that would allow it to take a more active role in forest management

worldwide. PNG is a test case that indicates that if the proposed

new policy emphasizes industrial forestry and excludes other

management paradigms, it will fail to protect forests and local

livelihoods. Elements of the new policy that have been showcased in

PNG indicate the World Bank is primarily concerned with ensuring

continued industrial harvest of old-growth rainforest ecosystems.

Forests.org works to end deforestation, preserve old-growth forests,

conserve all forests, maintain climatic systems and commence the age

of ecological restoration.

Copyright 2001, Forests.org, Inc.