The European Parliament today voted overwhelmingly in favour of a law banning illegal timber from one of the world's biggest markets. Europe uses huge volumes of illegal timber, mainly from countries with weak governance where corporate criminals and mafia gangs cause great environmental damage, rob governments of revenue and have even fuelled civil war.
This May, Greenpeace took Oscar-winning actress Marion Cotillard to the Democratic Republic of Congo to witness the situation for herself. She said: "I've seen how large-scale timber operations are threatening the planet's last intact forests. They're being eaten away from the inside. This extraordinary ecosystem that supports the lives of tens of millions of people and is the planet's second largest green lung is in danger."
Greenpeace EU forest policy director, Sébastien Risso, said: "This law hangs up a 'closed for business' sign to a destructive market. It promises to level the playing field so legitimate companies and customers are better able to act sustainably."
Apart from banning illegal timber from the EU market, other significant steps forward are a requirement on companies in Europe to verify wood products thought to be illegal and trace timber back to the country of harvest. Offenders could be fined in proportion to the environmental damage and economic losses they cause. Regrettably, member states opposed minimum penalties and sanctions at EU level, printed materials will be exempted for at least five years and it will take two years before the new law is applied.
Risso added: "Greenpeace will be vigilant and ensure the law is effectively enforced and companies stand by their obligations. But more needs to be done to tackle the EU's destructive impact on the world's forests. Agriculture is the major cause of deforestation. The goldrush into biofuels threatens to exacerbate this. Without more strong measures to tackle these issues, such as a robust financing mechanism to support forest protection, rainforests will soon be just a memory."
A recent UN report found that ancient forests worldwide have decreased by an area the size of Germany and Denmark put together, more than 40 million hectares, since 2000 (1). To tackle climate change we must end global deforestation by 2020.
A ten year Greenpeace campaign
Since launching its campaign to eliminate illegal logging a decade ago, scores of Greenpeace activists have put their lives at risk to blockade ports, halt wood shipments and go undercover to expose illegal logging in the Amazon, Central Africa, Russia and South-East Asia. Among the most important accomplishments were Greenpeace investigations from 2000-2003 which uncovered some of the main European timber traders paying for conflict timber from Liberia and fuelling a civil war that claimed over 250,000 lives. Undercover investigations also revealed illegal wood being used in the restoration of public buildings and at the heart of government in the UK in 2002, 2003 and 2006, Spain in 2005 and the European Union's headquarters in Brussels in 2004.