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Greenpeace forest campaigner and customary landowner, Sam Moko, from Papua New Guinea, at the Admiralty Arch wing of the Cabinet Office, London. Greenpeace highlighted the UK government's use of illegally logged rainforest timber in the building's refurbishment.
Enlarge imageAny government that allows imports of illegally or destructively logged timber must share the blame for the Paradise Forests' destruction.
Nearly 10 per cent of Australia's timber imports are illegally logged in countries close to home (like Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, including Papua), according to an Australian Department of Agriculture, Forests and Fisheries report.
Japan is the largest importer of Indonesian plywood, importing 62 per cent of all Indonesian plywood exports in 2005. Much of this plywood is used in construction and is thrown away once it is used.The US is the second largest importer, importing 14 per cent of all exports in 2005. The EU and China imported 13 per cent and nine per cent respectively in 2005.
Greenpeace demands world governments stop illegal and destructive logging and the trade in illegal timber.
Pressure the Australian government to stop illegal timber imports
Papua New Guinea government
Although virtually all Papua New Guinea’s land is owned by indigenous communities, logging companies have already acquired 70 per cent of Papua New Guinea’s available forest resources. The PNG government is planning to hand out concessions for most of the remaining accessible forest to logging companies, even though these companies flout the law.
Indonesian government
Indonesian Papua is home to Asia Pacific’s largest undamaged forests but logging companies are destroying them at an unprecedented rate. By January 2006, the Indonesian government granted 65 logging companies concessions on 11.6 million hectares of forests in Papua. Closer scrutiny of the concessions revealed that these companies are owned by a few national and multinational logging companies.
At least 76 per cent of logging in Indonesia, including Papua, is illegal. The stolen timber is sold on to milling operations in Indonesia or disappears offshore to feed the global market. This timber is likely to appear on the shelves of timber retailers in Japan, Europe or the US as cheap meranti or lauan plywood.
