Trading in RAINFORESTS

Forest and Bird, Issue 265, 1 August 1992, Page 33

Trading in RAINFORESTS

Grant Rosoman

The Rio Earth Summut in June saw governments dodging the issue of global deforestation. Developed countries suggested re-greening the earth with planted forests as an easy option, while governments of tropical timber producing countries claimed it as their sovereign right to exploit their forests as they wish. GRANT ROSOMAN examines New Zealand’ role in the rainforest timber trade.

RADING 1n rainforest timbers probably started in Mesopotamia over 4,000 years ago, with timbers shipped from India. Now in the late 20th century, the exploitation and destruction continues. Wood is today the world’s most widely traded wild product. Whether it be the temperate rainforests

of Canada, Chile or New Zealand, or the tropical forests of Sarawak, Fiji or Ghana, current logging practices are mining rather than sustaining the resource. This is particularly so in tropical rainforests where the complex and diverse plant and animal relationships within the forests cannot withstand present commercial logging practices. Logging has been a major contributor to the virtual exhaus-

tion of forests in Thailand, the Philippines, West Africa and Central America over the last 30 years, with Burma, Malaysia and parts of Indonesia following close behind. In the year to June 1991, New Zealand imported 13,408 cubic metres of tropical timber worth $22 million. Ninety percent comes from South-east Asia and the Pacific, where commercial logging is

the primary cause of forest destruction. Out of a $US6 billion international trade in tropical timbers, New Zealand’s imports are tiny compared with those of Japan, the United States and Europe. However, this in no way excuses our involvement in a destructive trade, and the social and environmental catastrophe that follows in its wake. These tropical timbers plus western red cedar logged from temperate rainforests in western Canada — in other words timber from unsustainable rainforest sources — now make up almost 80 percent of New Zealand’s timber imports by volume. Not a good record for a country which prides itself on being "green" and environmentally conscious. HY are tropical rainforests so special? Firstly, they are the richest source of life on earth. Even though they cover only six percent of the land area, they are home to most of the estimated 10 to 50 million species found on this planet. Scientists currently estimate that 50 different

wild species become extinct every day. The long-term consequences of this loss of biodiversity are incalculable. The rich gene pool of tropical forests is a valuable source of raw materials other than timber. Pharmaceuticals, medicines, organic insecticides, fruits and nuts, fibres, resins, oils and craft materials are impor-

tant to both the local and international community. For example, 70 percent of all plants identified by the US National Cancer Institute as useful in cancer treatment, are found only in tropical rainforests. The trade in rattan and other non-timber products in South-east Asia is valued at over US$3.5 billion, without even considering the importance of the products to the domestic economies.

Tropical rainforests provide a home or a livelihood to over 500 million people around the world. There are over 30 million people living in or on the edge of rainforests in South-east Asia and the Pacific Islands. Commercial logging and the subsequent degradation is threatening these traditional lifestyles and cultures.

In some areas, such as Sarawak, Burma and parts of Indonesia, serious human rights abuses are connected to the logging. The Penan people of Sarawak, for example, continue to be arrested and threatened with violence by the Sarawak government for defending their customary forests from logging (see Forest & Bird May 1991). Rainforests have a major stabilising influence on global, regional and local atmosphere and climate and their destruction is second only to the burning of fossil fuels as a source of greenhouse gases. On a local and regional level, tropical rainforest loss causes water shortages, droughts and floods. Deforestation was blamed for severe water shortages in seven out of eleven Peninsular Malaysian

Alternatives to rainforest timbers

HERE IS no present use of rainforest timber (both temperate and tropical) that cannot be met by some other available timber species. Plantation-grown eucalypts (various species) and macrocarpa (and other cypress species) are becoming more widely available and are very suitable. New Zealand’s huge resource of radiata pine could also be used as a replacement for structural decking and to some degree furniture and finishing tumbers. Other sources include tropical plantations overseas northern hemisphere hardwoods (for example oak and birch) and lowimpact portable mill operations carried

out by the customary landowners in the South Pacific and South America. There has been considerable criticism by those in the timber trade of the campaign to use alternatives to rainforest timbers. A common call is that there are no adequate substitutes available. Without doubt complete substitution is not easy and it often involves compromises in appearance and quality. However the alternative timber sources are improving and expanding rapidly. A newly established Auckland company NZ Hardwood Timber Ltd is processing and supplying high-quality eucalypt hardwoods. These are naturally durable and are suitable for replacing virtually all rain-

forest timbers. The excuses for continuing to use rainforest timbers are becoming steadily more feeble. In recent years there has been a huge increase in consumer awareness of the link between rainforest timbers and rainforest destruction. As a timber buyer you are in a powerful position to steer the timber trade towards more environmentally sound sources. Before buying timber question the source and forest management and ask for documentation. Timber suppliers and retailers must be held accountable for the products they are selling. By buying with a new environmental sensitivity you can save rainforests.

A Claytons rainforest policy

N FEBRUARY the New Zealand Timber Importers Association (NZTIA) announced their muchheralded policy on rainforest timber imports as the answer to the future of the trade. The centrepiece of the policy was the concept of "sustainable management’’. This was defined as "harvesting at a rate which keeps pace with the time it takes for a new generation to grow’, or in other words simply sustained timber yield. Unfortunately, this definition leaves out considerations of soil and water, the maintenance of biodiversity, the value of non-timber products, and the uses and rights of the customary owners. It reduces a complex forest ecosystem to a standing crop of timber. According to the World Bank and other organisations, there is not a single example of sustained yield logging of a tropical rainforest anywhere in the world, let alone management that maintains the myriad of other forest functions. As World Bank environmental officer Lee Talbot points out:

In practical terms, no commercial logging of tropical forests has been proven to be sustainable from the standpoint of the forest ecosystem, and any such logging must be recognised as mining, not sustaining the basic forest resource. So what are the sources the timber importers are proposing? They have yet to cite a forest that meets their "sustainable management" requirements. The importers give no indication as to when they intend to make the transition to sustainability. They also omit how they intend to monitor and certify this "sustainably" sourced timber. It would seem that the importers believe that their timbers already come from sustainable sources. The large number of unanswered questions that remain undermine the credibility of the new policy. Problems with the importation of tropical timbers are, of course, not confined to New Zealand. In Britain (the largest importer of these timbers in the European Community), a survey last year of over 600 companies by the World Wide Fund for Nature found that virtually all "green" claims

about tropical timbers were unsubstantiated. Most of the claims centred around "sustainability" of the source. To the New Zealand importers’ credit, they have recognised the unsustainability of timber from Sarawak, and have consequently chosen to not "knowingly" buy from there. At present, however, there is no way of knowing whether timber processed and then exported from

states last year, as well as the catastrophic floods which killed thousands in the Philippines and also in Thailand in recent years. Protecting rainforests and replanting deforested areas is essential if climate change is to be slowed or averted. OW LONG can the timber trade and human demand for wood keep on desecrating these precious forests? Recent estimates

by international rainforest ecologist Dr Norman Myers suggest that by the year 2000, apart from areas already protected, the only significant areas of tropical rainforest remaining will be in Irian Jaya and Papua New Guinea, the Zaire basin, the Guyanan countries of South America and the western Brazilian Amazon. South-east Asia, where a quarter of the earth’s tropical moist forests are found, accounts for 30 percent or 42,000 square kilometres annually of world-wide tropical forest loss. Commercial logging isn’t the only direct cause of tropical rainforest destruction but it is a major primary cause.

The UN Food and Agricultural Organisation calculated that over half of global deforestation is in already logged-over forest land (70 percent for South-east Asia). Logging opens up a forest to secondary factors such as encroachment by landless settlers, agricultural development and to fire. HERE IS SOME HOPE on the horizon with concern from many in the timber and building trade. For the past year the New Zealand Rainforests Coalition (including Forest and Bird) has been meeting with timber

What you can do ¢ Use the alternatives to rainforest timbers. ¢ Write to the Ministers of Conservation, Environment, Forestry, and External Relations and Trade, calling for restrictions on the import of rainforest timbers, pointing out the contradiction in marketing pine overseas to save rainforests while still importing rainforest timbers ourselves. * Support the planting of specialpurpose timber species in New Zealand, such as eucalypts, cypress species and others that do not require chemical preservation treatment.

Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea or Hong Kong, originates from Sarawak. Also, since June this year, the importers are not buying timber from either Sabah or Brazil. They claim to have alerted their suppliers in the tropics as to their policy and the change to "sustainable" sources. All very encouraging steps. Conservation groups have urged them to buy timber from small-scale, low-impact portable sawmill operations in the Solomon Islands and elsewhere, plantation tropical timbers such as rubberwood from Malaysia, teak from Java, hoop pine from Australia, and New Zealand plantation-grown alternatives such as eucalypts and macrocarpa (see panel). The policy claims that commercial logging plays a minor role in global rainforest destruction, citing a 1981 FAO figure of 6.6 percent. This much-quoted but out-of-date figure has been discredited by the World Bank, World Resources Institute and the Ecologist magazine, who give global estimates of 18 to 50 percent. The FAO notes, furthermore, that in Asia over two thirds of the forest cleared by landless cultivators, fire or for agricul-

ture, had already been logged over. This again highlights the primary role that logging plays in deforestation, especially in Asia, the source of 75 percent of New Zealand’s tropical timber imports. Finally, many of the tropical timber species the policy lists as being necessary for specialist uses, such as merbau, meranti, hopea, keruing, chengal, sapele, iroko and ramin, have been listed as endangered, vulnerable or requiring conservation measures by the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the International Tropical Timber Organisation (ITTO). Many have become commercially extinct where they were once common, due to exhaustive harvesting. Two species commonly used in New Zealand, merbau and ramin, were very nearly included on the CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) appendices earlier this year, only being withdrawn after pressure from Malaysia and Indonesia. The trade seems totally unwilling to respond to these concerns, preferring to "mine" species to extinction and then move on to another species or a new area.

retailers and importers. Considerable progress has been made towards working out avenues for the phase-out of rainforest timbers from destructive sources. As a first step, the retailers Benchmark, Carter Holt Building Supplies and Placemakers have agreed to end all advertising of tropical timber decking. The retailers and the New Zealand Timber Importers Association have fully supported the growing and use of specialpurpose timber species such as eucalypts and macrocarpa as alternatives to rainforest timbers. But is the reform of the trade fast enough? Where is the New Zealand government’s response to deforestation? It seems the government is promoting plantations as the answer to deforestation: a strategy that could see more rainforests being cleared and indigenous people dislocated to make way for plantations. Other governments are making efforts to restrict the tropical timber trade. The Austrian government, for example, has placed a 70 percent levy on unsustainable sources and required all tropical timber to be labelled. The plight of the earth’s remaining rainforests and their management is a matter of extreme urgency. The New Zealand Rainforests Coalition in its recent "Tropical rainforest policy for

New Zealand" has called for trade restrictions on timber imports, especially those from South-east Asia logged without customary landowner approval. The coalition has also urged the adoption in Pacific nations of comprehensive forest reserves, low-impact extraction methods that minimise damage to the forests, and for plantations to be established without further forest clearance. It has called for a phase-out of all unsustainable imports from these countries within two years. The global rainforest timber trade is now at a point where it can help mould the future of the world’s remaining rainforests. New Zealand is ideally placed to lead the world in changing to alternative timber sources such as our extensive plantation resource and to timber milled by low-impact methods in the Asia-Pacific region. It is time for the world to cut loose from a "sunset" industry and a history of rainforest desecration, and move to a future where forests are treasured for the life-supporting systems that they are. %

works for

the New Zealand Rainforests Coalition and is based in Christchurch.

Rainforest timbers commonly used in New Zealand Balau Giam Kwila Balau Kiolo Kiolo Lauan Ramin Tuan Jelutong Fijian Kauri Chengal Kempas KamarereTeak | Chengal Salusalu Erima Sapele Rimu Vitx NZ Beech | Western Kahikatea Tawa NZ Beech red cedar USES oN PLS £8 8 ES ESS ds Alternative timbers $ S ws ws & we gree se ¥ + oe Locally grown Radiata pine v / v v / "A vo vo / v Douglas fir / v Eucalypts v of vf vf v "A of vf vf Macrocarpa / vf / v "A vf of A vf vf Oak v vf / v / v Customwood / / v v Recycled timber v vf / v o "A v v Imported Hoop pine v /v / Rubberwood / / / v