Abseiling to save forests

As a Papua New Guinean and a landowner I thought it was necessary to do this in order to highlight the continued problems in the forestry sector in my country.  People need to stand up for what they believe in.  I believe that this style of communication was required to communicate to the government and the ITTO that more must be done to stop forest destruction in PNG.  

It has been great to see how much support we got from the community after we hung this banner.  Despite the continued claims by the government that everything is fine when it comes to logging, most of us know that this is not the case.  

The argument was proved again by the ITTO diagnostic report on sustainable forest management in PNG, which found that the Papua New Guinea Forest Authority (PNGFA) is more concerned with logging for the financial benefit of the government than it is with sustainably managing our forest resource.  This goes against the PNG constitution which specifically states:

"We declare our fourth goal to be for Papua New Guinea's natural resources and environment to be conserved and used for the collective benefit of us all, and be replenished for the benefit of future generations. We accordingly call for (1) wise use to be made of our natural resources and the environment in and on the land or seabed, in the sea, under the land, and in the air, in the interests of our development and in trust for future generations."

We have some of the best forest laws in the world but currently, the government cannot demonstrate that it can enforce these laws.  Meanwhile the majority of industry players in PNG have shown time and time again that they cannot be trusted to responsibly manage the forests.

Greenpeace wants companies logging in PNG to follow PNG’s Forest laws.  Proper third party certification is also needed to ensure that timber and wood products exported from the country are legal and come from environmentally and socially responsible concessions.

The PNG government must immediately implement a moratorium on the expansion of industrial logging in its ancient forests.  This must occur in order to fix the many problems in the forestry sector and to provide time to undertake truly participatory land use planning, which includes indigenous landowners and environmental and social NGOs.

The protection of large expanses of rainforest has become a global issue and was identified by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as one of the most cost-effective ways to mitigate against climate change.

A moratorium will also allow time for re-evaluating the carbon stored in the forests in order to come up with innovative approaches to protect the forest and its carbon to prevent global climate change instead of illegal and destructive logging.  PNG could benefit financially from conserving not destroying forests.  

Greenpeace is not against development in PNG but we think that it should not be at the expense of the environment and landowners.  There has to be a balance.  

We believe that by getting rid of illegal and destructive logging in PNG we are actually strengthening the future of the economy.  Consumers around the world are starting to demand timber that comes from logging concessions which are sustainably managed in an environmentally and socially responsible way.  Unless the forestry sector in this country is fixed, fewer people will want to buy PNG timber.  

It is clear that cleaning up the problem and moving towards credible third party certification (like FSC) will ensure continued market access for PNG timber.

Greenpeace thanks the ITTO for its report as it confirms what NGOs and other organisations have been saying for many years – that there are serious problems in the PNG forestry sector and that government and industry are doing nothing about it.  We hope that the ITTO  now takes immediate steps to help PNG address these problems.

It will take political will to act on the recommendations outlined in the ITTO report.  A strong leader is needed to fix the forestry sector otherwise things will only get worse and there will be nothing left for our children’s future. Lukautim Bus – Stopim Korapsen. 
 
By Sam Moko, Greenpeace PNG Forest Campaigner. 

This article appeared in the PNG based  Post Courier as a Focus Column on the May 14, 2007