Hunting Endangered Species: World Bank and Logging Companyies

[Guest guest]

The following letter is long, but one line caught my attention and I urge

others to look into this matter of the World Bank and Logging Company

policies in Central Africa:

 

>> It includes a U$ 500 sport hunting tax for Mountain Gorillas, a separate

one for bonobo, chimps, elephants, okapis etc etc.<<

 

Jane Dewar

Founder Gorilla Haven

www.gorilla-haven.org

 

Mr. James D. Wolfensohn

 

President

 

The World Bank

 

Washington D.C. 20433

 

OPEN LETTER

 

Nanyuki, Dec.7th 2002

 

Dear Mr. Wolfensohn,

 

Attached is a copy of your letter sent to me on April 3rd 1998, in response to

me presenting you with evidence linking industrial logging with the

commercialization of the bush meat trade throughout most of Central Africa. You

state;

 

" Preventing the types of abuses you describe is a clear responsibility of

the industry, as

 

well as the government authorities concerned. "

 

So far we seem to have one much celebrated -albeit not audited- partnership

deal and project trying to mitigate the impact of logging on wildlife (this is a

deal between CIB and WCS in northern Congo B).

 

The main problem is that neither the logging company nor the government has

accepted financial responsibility for this pilot project. If anything is today

very unsustainable in Northern Congo B, it is the fact that the donor and

conservation community has to come up with close to U$ 1 million annually to try

to manage poaching and wildlife inLESS THAN HALF of one single concession (500

000 hectares out of 1.2 million held by a German owned company turning over some

U$ 50 million in timber sales a year). A book to be published by the University

of California Press in early 2003 will outline the contradictions of this

approach.

 

I have just returned from a three-week trip in the DRC where the World Bank

appears to be on the front line of assisting with the proposed massive

reactivation of the forestry sector.

 

The projections outlined by your lead expert, in an Aide Memoire, are terrifying

to say the least, considering that we are looking at the remaining half of the

Congo River Basin which has not been affected yet by industrial timber mining.

 

- The opening up, in form of new logging concessions, of 60 million

hectares of primary rain forest.

 

- A projected annual extraction/mining of some 6-10 million cubic meters,

essentially doubling the output from the Central African region.

 

- An estimated annual 'surface rental tax' income of some U$ 60 to 360

million.

 

- An annual industry turn over of some U$ 1-2 billion. Mostly of course

staying in form of profits in some off shore accounts.

 

- The creation of some 60 000 jobs.

 

How realistic are these projections in the context of the results being

achieved - partially under World Bank supervision - in any of the surrounding

countries? Bank officials are best placed to answer this question and some more

regarding the actual cost -benefits of logging of primary rain forests.

 

Based on the figures I have they are clearly a pipe dream. However pipe dreams

put out officially by World Bank experts will make any conservation effort -

especially the creating of additional protected areas - a lot more difficult. (I

was informed that some GEF money would be made available to look at areas such

as Lomako and the Bili-Uere region. One already logged out and returned to the

government before the war the other having no value in terms of forestry

exploitation).

 

As for logging sustainably 60 million hectares of primary rain forest, to be

opened up within a span of only 5 to 10 years, there are World Bank experts on

record stating:

 

" We are not going to try to define SFM (Sustainable Forest Management)

because

 

nobody can agree on it " . This is probably more true in Central Africa than

anywhere

 

else.

 

I also have a copy of meeting minutes with World Bank officials being quoted as

saying:

 

" In Central Africa dysfunctional governments have to be considered a

given. "

 

Putting the above in context with state logging revenue actually resulting in

some real poverty alleviation or development, the chance is very high that after

most of the really valuable timber has been carted away, the 35 million people,

now estimated to depend on these forests will actually be poorer then they are

today.

 

This will certainly be true as far as the protein from wildlife is concerned. In

most areas there will be no more under the present projections and proposals.

 

The Aide Memoire by Mr. Debroux, the Banks lead negotiator and advisor, dated

March 2002 makes it clear that the Bank has been involved very actively in the

drafting of the new forestry laws which were signed by President Kabila in

August this year.

 

The word 'faune' or wildlife does not appear a single time. There is certainly

no indication that Mr. Debroux or the officials in Kinshasa were aware of your

line of thinking, of the industry and government having to accept the

responsibility for the wildlife management in the concessions. There is no

reference of any kind concerning the logging industry having to accept the

responsibility to actively manage the wildlife in their concession. (The Aide

Memoire seems to suggest that this responsibility will be passed on to the

relevant government departments. An approach which has not worked anywhere

else, especially considering the CIB/WCS figures which would indicate that all

of the 'surface land' tax income might be necessary to try to achieve some real

control.)

 

Mr. Debroux in a personal comment mentioned that this could be added - as an

afterthought - in the 'cahiers de charge'.

 

The Aide Memoire also states:

 

" La mission a aussi recu copie de plusieurs texts d'application en

preparation, et elle

 

apportera ses avis techniques a la demande du gouvernment. "

 

As such, it would appear to be a safe assumption that World Bank officials

would have also reviewed the Arret Interministeriel signed by two ministers on

April 20, 2002 which sets out the new forestry and wildlife utilization taxes

and which are based on: " The socio-economic context of the day. "

 

It includes a U$ 500 sport hunting tax for Mountain Gorillas, a separate one

for bonobo, chimps, elephants, okapis etc etc.

 

All this wildlife is offered for 'D'abbatage' (which can be roughly translated

at putting down or slaughter " ) and or for capture and export. The tax list also

includes fees for various byproducts such as ivory, rhino horn, skins, teeth,

tails, skulls etc.

 

A tax is fixed for the export of Afromosia timber. Afromosia, I understand, is

CITES protected and the DRC has been suspended from CITES and as such no member

country would be allowed to import any such timber.

 

In March 2002 Mr. Debroux estimated the 'Surface logging tax " to bring in

between US$ 30 to 360 million a year, based on Cameroon (where pretty much all

the timber is now gone) having a tax of 6 dollars per hectare and neighboring

Congo B, which is also opened up for logging in a big way having a medium of

only U$ 0.70.

 

The Congo tax in this document has been set out as: U$ 0.50 per hectare or

taking Mr. Debroux estimates for an income of U$ 60 -360 million are already

down to U$ 30 million, based on opening up some 60 million hectares. (That would

not be even half of what would be needed for wildlife management as per the

WCS/CIB pilot project.

 

Reading the three documents in context with the meeting feedback from

Kinshasa, it is impossible to not come to the conclusion that top decisions

makers, with the advise from the World Bank, have made a conscience decision

that Congo's wildlife might become a liability in maximizing the returns from

the forestry sector - at least in areas outside the protected parks.

 

This conclusion was essentially confirmed during a meeting with the former

minister of the Environment, who together with the Minister of Finance (said to

be a bank appointee) signed this Arret Interministeriel. He stated that

elephants were often a problem and a danger as far as the local population was

concerned and that the government had to put the well being of the people above

that of the animals. When I asked why the gorillas were on the list he informed

us that even the gorillas were a nuisance as far as the local villagers were

concerned.

 

These recent developments are more than just disturbing, they are a clear

message that the basics of trying to conserve biodiversity are not understood

and not understood by the local officials but possibly also by World Bank

experts. We are clearly going backwards, in a country, which offered some hope

in the sense that a new approach to industrial logging would have been possible.

 

Attached is once again the report we prepared after secretly visiting a German

logging concession in the DRC, in bonobo habitat in 1998, as well as the

reaction from the logger which shows that they have the capacity to take

corrective measures, if the right PR pressure is applied - or if these

conditions were enshrined in the laws of the land.

 

Except it would appear that is not the view your officials or that of the

administration in Kinshasa.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Karl Ammann

 

Enclosures mentioned