Forestry & Development E-News

 www.forestryanddevelopment.com                                                                                                                           March 2007

Forestry & Development E-News is an 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.

Global consumer demand for timber products certified under the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) scheme makes up a small proportion of the timber market, contrary to claims by Green groups WWF and Greenpeace.

A report from the UK's Timber Trade Federation recently stated that although 56 per cent of wood and wood products imported into the UK in 2005 were certified, demand for certified timber made up just 10 per cent of sales. FSC products made up 50 per cent of UK's certified imports. More information is available here.

A survey of furniture stores conducted by Ethical Corporation (a UK-based independent publisher) revealed that retailers are reluctant to display certification logos on their products (with only one out of 15 stores doing so), fearing that they may 'confuse the customer'. A related news item is available here.

A recently-launched pro-FSC website http://www.whyfsc.com/ admits that the price premium for FSC product is practically non-existent - which is a sign of a weak demand. The website states that 'the price difference - where there is one - is often only marginal', and claims that the difference is caused by cheap illegal timber (rather than consumer demand for FSC certification).

These findings stand in stark contrast to the picture painted by WWF and Greenpeace:

'Despite the fact that the PNG Government recognises the FSC as a voluntary certification scheme, the international timber market is otherwise showing FSC or equivalent schemes are mandatory… Consumers in Europe and the United States and increasingly in other major timber markets are not interested in uncertified timber… This is the reality of today's international timber market trend' (Michael Avosa, WWF-PNG's Country Programme Manager, 2006).

'FSC certified timber [is] achieving a higher price in the market than equivalent uncertified timber' (WWF International, 2007).

'Support for the FSC label is high among major purchasers and retailers of forest products, but the tens of billions of dollars in market demand for FSC products still far exceeds supply' (Greenpeace International, 2007).

The Forest Stewardship Council was established by WWF, Greenpeace and other environmental NGOs. These NGOs continue to have controlling interests in the FSC. There is widespread evidence of Green groups pressuring retailers and governments towards pro-FSC procurement policies, and attacking alternative certification schemes and uncertified forestry. Support for the FSC is not being driven by the market but by NGOs, who are pressuring governments, retailers and forestry companies to adopt forestry management standards which the same NGOs developed. This is a far cry from forest certification operating as a market-based instrument (as least in the case of FSC).

A GREEN ATTACK ON THE WTO AND THE UNCED CONSENSUS

09/02/07: In a speech last month to ECIPE (European Centre for International Political Economy) in Brussels, the Chairman of World Growth, Alan Oxley, said that the WTO was being weakened by ENGO campaigns to create a global convention on forestry.

The EU has threatened  to ban timber trade with developing countries unless they comply with onerous legal standards. These standards would ordinarily be prohibited under WTO rules, but the EU is attempting to induce exporting developing countries to sign away their WTO rights under voluntary partnership agreements and environmental partnership agreements, under threat that if they do not, the EU will ban the timber imports anyway.

WWF, Greenpeace and the FSC have heavily lobbied governments to breach fair competition standards to include only FSC-certified products in their procurement policies. The lobbying is part of a long-term campaign to have FSC standards used as an import control.

This campaign is part of a long-term attack by WWF and Greenpeace on the WTO. The casualty in this campaign will not be the WTO. Rather, it will be developing countries who will lose valuable export income.

The campaign demonstrates how environmental lobbyists operating in Europe have overturned the global consensus of the Rio Earth Summit, namely, that improving the environment must be linked to raising living standards. Unfortunately, protection of the environment is now pre-eminent in development policy.

Mr Oxley's full speech will be posted on the ECIPE website later this month. A briefing on the speech can be found here.

STATE OF ASIA AND THE PACIFIC'S FORESTS IMPROVING

13/03/07: The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's (FAO) State of the World's Forests report reveals that the world's forests are not on the verge of catastrophe.

The report, released on March 13, highlights the reforestation that is currently taking place around the world. A total of 57 countries reported a net increase in total forest area in the period from 2000 to 2005.

Also highlighted in the report was the net increase in forest area in Asia and the Pacific. Papua New Guinea's rate of forest change for the past decade stood at 0.5 per cent per annum, unchanged since the 1990s. It is a rate of change that is considerably lower than all of Africa, Central America and Southeast Asia.

The full report can be read here.

SGS SHOWS PNG TIMBER IS LEGAL - PNG TRADE MINISTER

15/02/07: In a speech at a recent illegal logging seminar funded by the UK's Department for International Development (DFID), Papua New Guinea's Trade Minister Paul Tiensten disputed allegations by environmental NGOs that commercial logging in PNG is illegal.

Statistics provided by Société General de Surveillance (SGS), an international provider of monitoring services, were used as evidence. The  Minister asserted the sovereignty of the PNG government to make policy, and the need for those who want to participate in the process to follow proper procedures.

The Minister also argued that the World Bank Forest and Conservation Project in Papua New Guinea was cancelled because the World Bank was influenced by environmental NGOs who were primarily concerned with forest conservation, rather than development of sustainable commercial native forestry. The full version of Paul Tiensten's speech can be found here.

EUROPEAN GOVERNMENTS REJECT WWF CAMPAIGN TO PROCURE TIMBER PRODUCTS ONLY CERTIFIED BY FSC

01/03/07: Germany's federal government has launched a government procurement scheme and a consumer guide for the purchase of wood and wood products from legal and sustainable sources. The newly-announced procurement policy accepts FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) and the PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification Schemes) certification as verification of legality and sustainability; 'comparable proofs' will also be accepted (although it is not clear what this means). The procurement policy will be reviewed after four years.

The German government also released a consumer guide for sustainable shopping, which also recommends the PEFC label. 'Nachhaltig einkaufen: Der Wegweiser' ('The Sustainable Buying Guide') is available in German here. A related press release from Germany's Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety can be accessed here.

The UK government has recently ruled that five certification scheme (including FSC and PEFC) meet the requirements for legality and sustainability in its procurement policy. The Dutch government has indicated that it will also accept these five certification schemes as proof of legality. The UK, Netherlands and Denmark are currently negotiating on harmonisation of their procurement policies. While environmental groups continue to argue that FSC is the only credible certification scheme, this sentiment is obviously not shared by governments in Europe.

Greenpeace encourages its supporters not to think

05/03/07: The European Union (EU) has concluded a public consultation on the introduction of "additional measures" to combat illegal logging. The consultation included an extensive questionnaire posted on the EU website. In a related press release, Greenpeace International discouraged visitors to the Website from filling in the questionnaire, warning them of 'beaurocratic [sic] technobabble'. Instead, they were urged to send a submission "custom made" by Greenpeace, which called for an outright ban on EU imports of illegal timber. Greenpeace failed to notify the readers that such a ban is likely to conflict with the EU's obligations to the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

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