Beijing, China, March 28, 2006--Rising Chinese demand for wood and the developed world's desire for cheap wood products are fueling the illegal timber trade and the destruction of ancient forests in the Asia-Pacific region, the environmental group Greenpeace said Tuesday.
Calling it an unprecedented crisis, Sze Pang Cheung, deputy campaign director for Greenpeace China, said illegal logging was rampant in countries such as Indonesia and Papua New Guinea that provide China with wood.
Between 76 percent and 90 percent of the logging in those two countries is illegal, the group said in a newly released report. Late last year a crackdown on illegal logging in the Indonesian archepelago and in Borneo slowed the illicit trade. Sadly, as early as last January renewed logging on a massive scale, even in protected national forests, came to light.
Once in China, the lumber is turned into furniture, flooring and plywood for both domestic consumption and export to markets in the United States, Europe and Japan to satisfy rising demand for inexpensive wood products, the report said.
"This destructive trade is fueling the global forest crisis," Cheung said, adding the report is being sent to Chinese leaders.
On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said that the government has been "consistently opposed to illegal logging," but added that it should be tackled as a global issue.
"It is not the issue of any single country or a particular region. To combat illegal logging and the trade in this regard is the common responsibility of all countries," he said.
Cheung said developed nations, which have switched to buying processed products from China instead of buying timber directly from other countries, were equally to blame for the problem since the rate of wood consumption in rich countries was even higher than in China.
The world's forests cannot continue to sustain the huge global demand, he said. Within a decade, lowland rain forest areas in Indonesia could disappear if logging continues at its current rate, Cheung said. Papua New Guinea's forests could also be depleted in the same time period, he said.
In the last decade, China has become the world's largest importer of tropical timber--half of all tropical trees being logged globally end up in China. Total consumption of wood products in China increased by 70 percent in those 10 years, the report said.
Ironically, China's protection of its own domestic forests, triggered after flooding caused by deforestation killed some 3,000 people in 1998, pushed it to seek timber from other sources.
The report links China's demands with an increase in illegal logging and trade, particularly in the tropical rain forests that cover Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. The two countries are losing an estimated 2 million hectares (5 million acres) of forest annually, the report said.
At the same time Cheung said China has started to take notice of the environmental impact of consumption. The government is expected to announce a 5 percent tax on disposable chopsticks and hardwood flooring in a bid to decrease consumption.
In its report, Greenpeace is recommending several measures, including urging China and other governments to introduce legislation to ban the import and export of wood from illegal sources, adopting a global network of protected areas, and reducing consumption in developed nations.
