world news - 14.04.2008
Russia Plans Timber Tracking to Control Illegal Logging
The new system was announced by Valery Roshchupkin, head of
the Russian Ministry of Natural Resource's Federal Agency for Forestry,
or Rosleskhoz, at a meeting of the Interdepartmental Commission on
Prevention of Illegal Timber Circulation.
The system is intended to facilitate reduction in illegal logging in
the country. The unified information system will track the transfer of
timber from the moment it is harvested to its processing and transfer
to export.
The second program developed by the commission is the
introduction of compulsory accounting of timber at entry and exit of
wood processing plants.
Semyon Levi, deputy head of the Ministry of Natural Resources,
said 10 percent of all timber harvested in Russia is illegal. In total,
180 million cubic meters of lumber is felled in Russia each year.
Forests cover about 45 percent of the land area of Russia, and
the most recent Rosleskhoz report, issued March 12, shows 82 billion
cubic meters of "growing stock."
Allowable annual forest cuts equal 635 million cubic meters, the report shows.
The report, issued by Roshchupkin, indicates that the country has put
in place a "new national forest policy, the liberalization of access to
forest resources, the guarantees of federal and regional governments
towards implementation of investment projects and preferential packages
for businesses, and a tough customs policy."
With these factors in place, the report concludes that "Russia has
established proper conditions for forest resources development,
implementation of priority projects and attraction of investments
towards wood-processing industry modernization."
The Russian NGOs Forest Club, an informal working group of
representatives from the largest NGOs working for Russian forest
conservation, says that illegal logging falls into three categories.
There are pure criminal activities such as logging without official
permission, timber theft, falsification of documents, financial crimes,
use of violence against local peoples, law violations by authorities,
and corruption.
Then there is illegal activity in forests by poor people
seeking to satisfy their basic needs for food and fuel. They will
engage in forest encroachment and forest land conversion for
agriculture usage, and poach trees.
And there is the lack of law enforcement, the NGOs say.
In addition, government authorized thinnings that are done in
middle-aged, premature or mature forests, allow thinnings to be a
source of commercial wood.
"According to existing Russian practice," says Alexey Yaroshenko of
Greenpeace Russia, "almost 100 percent of such commercial thinnings
actually are represented by high-grading (creaming) of stands, that
leaves degraded, unhealthy and often unstable stands."
These "thinnings" are one of the major sources of unregistered and
unpaid (illegal) wood, especially of most valuable hardwoods and high
grades of softwood logs," he said.
Time alone will tell whether Russia's new unified information tracking
system will be able to control any or all of these forms of illegal
logging.
See also:
- — New Zealand Wood welcomes forestry productivity indicators
- — Siberia's black market logging
- — Timber industry is in trouble
- — Russia: First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov proposes to set up a cluster of wood-working companies in the Russian Far East
- — European Commission voices concern after Russian duty rise
