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FOREST CONSERVATION NEWS TODAY
Japan Targets Illegal Logging, But Old-Growth Still
Threatened
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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org, Inc.
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March 11, 2002
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by Forests.org
Japan’s government is moving to support some type of
forest
certification.
Japan should be lauded for facing up to their dirty
little secret – that their forest product consumption is
devastating
forest ecosystems far and wide. It is heartening to see government
acknowledgement that illegal logging jeopardizes global
security and
sustainability.
However, there are many unanswered questions. What of legal logging?
Huge government sanctioned commercial logging operations
continue to
deforest and ecologically diminish the World’s forests –
even the
Earth’s last old-growth primary forests. Surely when fewer than 20%
of the World’s primary forests exist in an intact,
natural condition;
most of what remains should be saved as global ecosystem
and
biodiversity reserves on the basis of their ecological
and genetic
materials. What flavor
of certification? Everyone is for forest
certification these days - even the World Bank (as long
as commercial
logging continues).
I doubt Japan favors Forest Stewardship Council
(FSC) certification – the most rigorous though still
seriously flawed
system - and anything less is business as usual and
unacceptable.
Even FSC encourages and supports commercial logging of
old-growth.
Certified “green” logging does not protect primary
old-growth forests
from first time intensive logging. Indeed, it validates and
legitimizes continued forest and biodiversity loss.
This is a nice gesture on the part of the Japanese
government, but it
is hopelessly too late and too little. Old-growth logging must end
now, and certification rigorously pursued in regenerating
and planted
forests.
Certifying as green anything less ecologically rigorous is
a blatant lie that environmentalists will not buy.
g.b.
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Japan to
propose system to combat illegal logging
Source: Copyright
2002 Japan Times
Date: March 10,
2002
WASHINGTON (Kyodo) Japan has decided to propose
introducing an
international system to verify that wood and wood
products originate
from appropriately managed forests to an ongoing U.N.
conference on
forestry, Japanese diplomatic sources said Saturday.
The sources said Japan will make the proposal in an
effort to combat
illegal deforestation at the U.N. Forum on Forests, being
held in New
York until next Friday, adding that Japan will seek
approval for the
system to be set up at the upcoming World Summit on
Sustainable
Development from Aug. 26 to Sept. 4.
The system is to promote the use of legally felled wood
by labeling
such wood or wood products, the sources said.
Although the system has already been adopted by
nongovernmental
organizations working on environmental protection, the
proposal is
likely to face stiff opposition as some wood-exporting
countries
disagree with the plan, saying it may result in trade
discrimination
against them by limiting access to their products.
Japan is the world's biggest wood importer and imports
illegally
felled wood and wood products from countries, including
Russia and
Indonesia, where deforestation is becoming a serious
issue.
Japan decided that an international third-party agency to
verify and
label wood and wood products is necessary to combat
illegal felling.
Tokyo intends to offer the necessary assistance to
developing
countries, such as the provision of equipment to monitor
illegal
felling, technical aid and advice on improving legal
systems.
By tabling assistance as well as the proposal for the
verification
system, Japan hopes to win support from developing nations,
the
sources said.
Japan will ask the U.N. forest forum to mention the
importance of the
verification system in a statement to be adopted at
ministerial-level
talks Wednesday and Thursday for the Johannesburg
development
conference.
Wood and wood products originating from illegal
deforestation are
cheaper on the international market than products from
legally
managed
forests.
###RELAYED TEXT ENDS###
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