China’s Demand for Wood Endangering Russian Forest
Moscow, Russia, March 28--Increasing demand for wood by China's booming construction and furniture industries is endangering huge areas of Russia's Siberian forests, despite pledges by the respective governments to protect environmentally sensitive areas, forestry experts from the two countries claim, according to The Standard.
Russia, home to one-fifth of the world's forests, supplies about half of China's fast-growing raw timber imports, more than the next 12 suppliers combined. China now trails only the United States as a wood consumer. It has surpassed Japan as the biggest consumer of Russian wood and its appetite for forestry products is expected to continue growing rapidly.
With at least half of Russia's timber production illegal, the environmental impact is expected to worsen dramatically without concerted action by the two governments. The destructive practices have an impact far beyond Siberia, as the forest fires and deforestation stemming from the area's poor logging practices are suspected of being one of the factors contributing to global warming.
Experts say Russian forests will only be saved if Chinese buyers can be induced to adopt the sort of timber certification programs that are being developed in other countries, such as the United States and Britain. These programs are designed to ensure wood comes from environmentally sustainable logging operations.
Without intervention from Beijing or a boycott by western consumers of Chinese furniture, the chances of this happening appear remote. Although it is difficult to measure the exact size of the illegal trade, some 20-50 per cent of all Russian timber is illegally logged, according to estimates by various environmental groups, including the World Wide Fund for Nature.
Timber importers in China have turned northward for low-priced timber, making Russia the biggest supplier of logs to China, according to veteran forest expert Anatoly Lebedev and the WWF. According to wood trade figures quoted by a US-based group Pacific Environment, Russia exported 15 million cubic meters of timber to China in 2003, roughly half of the mainland's log imports. However, the figure may be higher as smuggled timber entering the country through small customs points may not be included in the statistics.
"We somehow have to regulate" the trade, said Lebedev, chairman of Vladivostok-based NGO Bureau for Regional Campaigns. China banned logging in large areas of the country following devastating floods in 1998 that were blamed on rampant tree cutting.
Although the ban has improved forestry management in China, it has accelerated timber poaching throughout Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia, and in Russia. China's domestic timber production has fallen while imports have skyrocketed. Imports of industrial wood, used in construction, furniture-making and pulp mills, have more than tripled since 1993.
According to the WWF, China's demand for imported industrial wood - including timber, paper and pulp - will grow by 33 percent, from the current annual 94 million cubic meters to 125 million cubic meters within five years.
One of the leading contributors to the growth is construction and its related sectors, said Zhu Chunquan, forest program director of the WWF based in Beijing.
Under a housing reform package set out in 1998, China was to construct five billion square meters of new housing and two billion square meters of renovated housing by 2005.
This initiative is part of the country's urbanization policy that aims at increasing living space and quality of the increasingly crowded Chinese cities.
