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MISSING LINKS: GREENPEACE'S REPORT SLAMS TIMBER COUNCIL

Arfa’eza A Aziz

May 20, 05 2:31pm

 

Renowned international environment group Greenpeace has blasted the Malaysia

Timber Certification Council (MTCC) for alleged failure to adhere to

international ecological, social and human rights standard of forest

management.

 

The environmental group has identified serious gaps in the certification

standards of the MTCC and has highlighted at length the lack of credibility

of the scheme in a report entitled Missing Links.

 

MTCC is an NGO established to plan and operate a voluntary national timber

certification to provide assurance to Malaysian timber buyers that the

products are sources from sustainable managed forests.

 

It originates with Malaysia’s attempts to counter Western’s calls for a

tropical timber boycott to halt deforestation.

 

In the report, it is alleged that the defects in the scheme includes:

• MTCC procedures do not ensure certified products are legal

• MTCC Chain of Custody (CoC) system does not require independent tracking

of wood from forest to first point of timber processing - a missing link

that means all MTCC CoC claims have no credibility

• There are no requirements to ensure independent verification of the chain

of custody of MTCC timber exported to Europe or elsewhere

• There are no credible checks on the origin of uncertified material that is

allowed to be mixed with certified material timber. This means that illegal

timber can enter the chain of custody and be sold as MTCC-certified

• Contrary to international treaties and standards, the MTCC system does not

address indigenous peoples land rights.

The allegations may affect Malaysia timber export especially in Europe

countries as the European Union has adopted an action plan that proposes to

restrict illegal logging and related trade.

 

Aware of report

 

Meanwhile MTCC chief executive officer Chew Lye Teng told malaysiakini that

it is aware of the report.

 

“We have explained to them our position but they refused to listen. We

cannot spend all our time talking to them because we have many other

responsibilities to attend to,” he said when contacted yesterday.

 

He declined to respond to the allegations over the phone and has yet to

reply to a set of questions that was e-mailed to him yesterday afternoon.

 

Meanwhile, in a press statement Veerle Dossche of the Greenpeace Belgium

Forest Campaign said that a review of new rules of the MTCC’s scheme to be

phased in during 2006 will not require an effective chain of custody from

stump to sawmill or third-party checks on the origin of uncertified timber.

 

“This means that illegal timber may continue to enter European markets as

MTCC certified. European timber buyers should be aware that MTCC

certification is not a guarantee of either legality or environmentally

responsible forest management, and worse MTCC timber may be stolen from

indigenous peoples’ lands.”

 

He also said that the assessments by the UK and Danish governments that MTCC

wood can be deemed legal may also have to be reviewed.

 

“Greenpeace urges timber buyers, governments and public authorities to

choose the standards and requirements of the Forest Stewardship Council

(FSC) and to avoid buying, specifying or recommending MTCC timber. FSC is

widely recognised as the international standard for responsible forestry and

currently the only credible certification scheme.”

 

In its first chapter, it stated that Malaysia’s forestry is characterised

largely by deforestation as over 500,000 hectares of forests in West

Malaysia were cleared between 1983 and 2004, while the entire country

(including Sabah and Sarawak) lost 2.7 million hectares of forests during

the 1990s alone.

 

“In fact, less than 20 percent of Malaysia’s original virgin forests remains

untouched.”

 

It claimed that the loss of forests has led to a significant decline of the

country’s bio-diversity, adding that it had led to more than 60 endemic tree

species to extinction, and threatens another 170 species of flowering plants

to becoming extinct.

 

It also claimed that MTCC had failed to counter deforestation, adding that

due to the huge demand for timber ensures that the forests in the Peninsula

continue to be logged - including in states which has been awarded a MTCC

certificate for sustainable forest management.

 

Of PFRs and FMU

 

It also cautioned overseas timber consumers to look behind the “impressive

land-use statistics” presented by MTCC’s lobbyists and be weary of the

“Permanent Forest Reserves” in the MTCC-certified states, adding that “the

forest are not as permanent as it is led to believe”.

 

This is because for the purpose of forests management certification, MTCC is

only concerned with the management of forests inside in permanent forests

reserves (PFRs) which is managed by the Forest Management Unit (FMU).

 

Although PFRs cannot be converted to non-forests “for as long as they are

classified as PFRs”, they are not protected from conversion because state

government can at will excise forests lands from their PFRs.

 

“MTCC simply disregards forests excised from an FMU as it is outside its

mandate - even if they are of high conservation value and integral to the

conservation management of forests areas at a landscape level.”

 

It claimed that MTCC will not de-certify any state that removes areas from

its FMU for conversion.

 

It also stated that news report in Malaysian media suggest that there is

evidence that illegal logging by timber thieves is rife in the Peninsular.

 

“Although MTCC does not bear direct responsibility for this, it appears to

be making little effort to encourage state forestry department it has

certifies to take a more dynamic stance in protecting the reserves from

timber thieves.”

 

In the report, Greenpeace also alleged that MTCC has failed to show enough

respect for the recognition of customary rights, tenures and user rights of

indigenous people and local forest communities, so much so that indigenous

organisations and most NGOs withdrew from the process of developing MTCC

scheme.

 

“(This is) because they realised that their continued involvement would only

serve to legitimise MTCC,” the report added.

 

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