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Forestry & Development E-News |
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www.forestryanddevelopment.com August 2006 |
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Forestry & Development E-News is a
new electronic newsletter which reports and comments on regional and
international developments in forestry. If you do not wish to receive
Forestry & Development E-News, please click here. |
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A NEW REPORT - "The Economic Importance of the Forestry Industry to Papua New Guinea" - was released on 26 July.
It finds that forestry is a consistent contributor to growth in PNG and could play a larger role in development in the future.
For the first time there is an effort to estimate the economic value of the infrastructure created by forestry.
The report countermands claims by Greenpeace and other Green NGOs that commercial forestry in PNG is unviable and gives PNG little economic value. To see the report in full click here. PNG’s forest industry employs 10,000 people, contributes 5 percent to GDP and a quarter of a million each year in exports. Export taxes on logs account for 3 to 6 percent of all tax.
PNG needs growth. The share of population living below the World Bank’s poverty line has fallen from 37.5 percent to 53.5 percent over the last decade. In rural areas, 4 out of 5 children do not attend school. The PNG economy is struggling.
The forest industry’s impact at the regional level is even greater. Forestry companies provide roads, air fields and services, wharves, schools and medical clinics. A case study of Western Province indicated the industry doubles the amount of infrastructure provided by the provincial government.
Greenpeace want commercial forestry replaced by eco-forestry which, despite 10 years of effort, has not proven to be commercially viable. The Greenpeace strategy would impoverish Papua New Guinea.
Forestry could do more
The report found the industry could contribute more if property rights, taxation and institutional arrangements and economic policies were improved.
The report was released this week by ITS Global who were commissioned by Rimbunan Hijau (PNG) Group, the largest forestry operator in PNG, to assess the current and potential economic significance of forestry in Papua New Guinea.
Baseless attacks on PNG forestry
The report follows a recent expose of Greenpeace’s attack on commercial forestry in PNG. Greenpeace claims most logging is illegal, the industry is guilty of human rights and labor abuses and is corrupt. In the report “Whatever it takes”, Greenpeace’s treatment of PNG as a pawn in a wider global campaign to control global forestry is revealed in detail, including pressure on governments and businesses in Europe to ban imports of timber. Its allegations against the PNG forest industry are examined in detail and revealed as baseless. The report is available on www.forestryanddevelopment.com.
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PnG's Mystery forestry critic For over two years, an anonymous electronic newsletter and website, Masalai i tokaut, has been circulating scurrilous claims about forestry in Papua New Guinea. This newsletter purports to provide examples of malfeasance and corruption in administration of forestry in Papua New Guinea, but refuses to accept responsibility for its claims. All claims are anonymous. ITS Global were commissioned to examine in detail the key claims and found they were either completely unsubstantiated or were based on much of the same unsubstantiated material used by Greenpeace in its attack on commercial forestry in PNG. The review of the material on the website is available on the Forestry and Development website. Click here to see the report.
new toolkit to assess effects of reforestation in australia 19/07/06: A Commercial-Environmental toolkit developed through a collaboration between CSIRO (Aus) and SCION (NZ) was launched in Australia on July 19 by the Australian Forest and Conservation minister Eric Abetz. This is a result of the National Association of Forest Industries (NAFI) Commercial-Environmental Forestry initiative (CEF) which was funded in the 2004 federal budget. This toolkit can be used by owners and managers to maximise the environmental outcomes. This will help companies to measure the environmental benefits of new plantations where previously the benefits of new plantations may have been overlooked.
OLD ALLEGATIONS OF TIMBER TRANSFER PRICING IN PNG RESURFACE 20/07/2006: A report in "The Australian” newspaper earlier this month alleged forestry industries were short-changing the PNG Government around A$100 million a year in taxes by transfer pricing. This was based on the claim made some time back by one consultant who compared changes in timber export prices from Malaysia and PNG in US dollars over several years. That does not demonstrate transfer pricing (many other factors set prices) as was explained to the journalist who wrote the story. Greenpeace a few days later dutifully referred to the story as evidence of transfer pricing.
greenpeace claims to broker deal to ban the use of 'illegally' grown soya in amazon 25/07/2006: Leading European supermarkets, food manufacturers and fast food chains such as McDonalds have pledged not to use soya ‘illegally’ grown in the Amazon region in response to Greenpeace’s claim that large areas of ‘virgin’ forests are being cleared for the crop. They have agreed a two year moratorium on soya “illegal” grown in the Amazon. The deal was brokered by Greenpeace UK, which linked the illegal destruction of the forest to large-scale soya farming.
PNG government lifts a ban on round-log exports from a central government agro-forest 26/07/2006: The PNG Government has lifted the ban on round log exports from a Central Provincial government agro-forest zone. This was a reversal of a 1993 decision to ban all a log exports in an 100km radius of a certain location (Baina agro-forestry project in Central Province). This project is owned 70% by the provincial government and 30% by a Malaysian investor.
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Forestry & Development E-News is published monthly by ITS Global (www.itsglobal.net). ITS Global are accredited assessors for the International Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification Schemes (PEFC)
Questions and feedback can be sent to forestrydevel@bigpond.com If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter, please click here. © 2006. All rights reserved
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