Nature Alert: EC pledges funds to stop illegal logging

Tuesday, 7 July 2009

EC pledges funds to stop illegal logging

personal note: where does all this money end up and - does it really do any good?

----------------------------------------------------

7 July, 2009

The European Commission has upped its fight against illegal logging by pledging €4.5m to the EU Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) facility at the European Forest Institute (EFI).

The money will be used to back the process of negotiating and implementing Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPA), bilateral trade agreements between the EU and wood exporting countries.

These agreements are designed to improve forest governance and introduce national verification systems checking the legality of timber imports into the EU.

Risto Päivinen, EFI director, and Roberto Ridolfi, head of unit in EuropeAid-F-3, countersigned a new grant agreement between EFI and the European Commission in Brussels.

This brings the EC contribution to EFI’s EU FLEGT Facility to a total of €12.8m.

http://www.ttjonline.com/story.asp?sectioncode=17&storycode=59771&c=2

Hall of Shame for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the Palm Oil Industry.

Nothing can prepare one for the sight of the systematic extermination of orangutans by the government of Indonesia.

Look at the photos and news articles on these pages in the context of a statement the President made to the media on 10th December 2007.

“In the last 35 years about 50,000 orangutans are estimated to have been lost as their habitats shrank. If this continues, this majestic creature will likely face extinction by 2050,” President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the launch of an orangutan conservation plan at the climate talks in Bali.

“The fate of the orangutan is a subject that goes to the heart of sustainable forests … To save the orangutan we have to save the forest.”

Statements like these are most welcome, but unless backed up by action, such words fall on deaf ears within the Ministry of Forestry....who are busy granting licences to cut down the very forests the President says they should protect!

When you think you are to busy to help, please could you reflect for a moment on .........

The following extract refers to environmental problems in general. I just hope you find it as thought provoking and relevant to orangutans as I have.

"This is such a shocking and unpalatable fact that most people deny it, or they just don't want to think about it. They believe as individuals, they can do little about it, so push it to the back of their minds. But I can't do that.

When something has to be done, we need to do it. It doesn't matter how big the challenge is or how hard the solution; if I know something is wrong, and I am in a position to help, I will do my best to make it right." Duncan Bannatyne, successful British businessman.