Subscribe free to our newsletters via your
. Earth Science News .




WOOD PILE
Liberia forests sold off in secret logging contracts: report
by Staff Writers
Dakar (AFP) Sept 4, 2012


Forty percent of Liberia's forests have been sold off in secretive and often illegal contracts, Global Witness said Tuesday, just days after the country's president announced a probe into the issuing of logging permits.

An investigation by the London-based natural resource watchdog has shown how, despite efforts to reform the country's logging sector, companies have used a legal loophole to score contracts covering a quarter of the nation's landmass.

The report comes after President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf announced on Friday an independent probe into the controversial permits, after suspending the managing director of the Forestry Development Authority, Moses Wogbeh.

"The new logging contracts termed Private Use Permits now cover 40 percent of Liberia's forests and almost half of Liberia's best intact forests," said a press release from Global Witness.

"They have given companies linked to notorious Malaysian logging giant Samling unparalleled access to some of Liberia's most pristine forests."

Samling and its subsidiaries have been involved in cases of illegal logging from Cambodia to Guyana to Papua New Guinea.

The Private Use Permits were designed to allow private land owners to cut trees on their property. But the investigation found that the 66 permits that have been issued are in fact allowing logging companies to sneak past Liberia's carefully crafted forest laws and regulations.

"Companies holding these permits are not required to log sustainably and pay little in compensation to either the Liberian government or the people who own the forests for the right to export valuable tropical timber," Global Witness said.

"Private Use Permits are great news for logging companies. They are very bad news for pretty much everybody else in Liberia," said Robert Nyahn of Save My Future Foundation, which also took part in the investigation.

Liberia's forests make up 42 percent of what is left of the Upper Guinean Rainforest -- just part of a fragmented system that once covered most of west Africa but has been reduced to 12 percent of its original reach.

Deforestation has been alarming, with 70 percent of the population involved in slash-and-burn farming, the country's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) told AFP in 2010.

While the use of "blood diamonds" to fund wars in the region is better known, it was timber that propped up armed factions, notably those of former president Charles Taylor, during 14 years of Liberian conflict that left over 250,000 people dead from 1989 to 2003.

In the nine years since the end of the conflict the Liberian government and international partners have worked hard to reform the industry, with the United States giving $30 million to help communities manage their forest resources.

The EU and the Liberian government have also recently negotiated a trade agreement meant to ensure that Liberia provides legal timber to European markets.

United Nations sanctions on the country's timber industry were lifted in 2006 and the government issued new licences covering nine percent of the country.

Global Witness said these new contracts have failed to deliver the promised benefits to the Liberian people and that many of these companies owe significant back taxes.

Silas Siakor of Liberia's Sustainable Development Institute said recent statements by the president on the logging scandal were "promising".

"Too frequently, those who abuse Liberia's natural resources have not been held to account," he was quoted as saying in the Global Witness press statement, calling for a comprehensive independent investigation.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's 2010 deforestation report, Africa has lost 3.4 million hectares (8.4 million acres) of forest in the past 10 years.

.


Related Links
Forestry News - Global and Local News, Science and Application






Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.

Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle








WOOD PILE
Natural Regeneration Building Urban Forests, Altering Species Composition
Syracuse NY (SPX) Aug 24, 2012
In forested regions of the nation, natural regeneration may help cities achieve tree cover goals at the expense of maintaining the desired tree species. A study by U.S. Forest Service scientists published recently in Urban Forestry and Urban Greening showed that on average, 1 in 3 trees in sampled cities were planted while two-thirds resulted from natural regeneration. However, for newly e ... read more


WOOD PILE
Congo, China, sign 975m-euro deal to rebuild Brazzaville

Obama hails govt response to Isaac 'devastation'

Post-Fukushima meeting calls for more work on nuclear safety

Romney off-message in storm-ravaged Bayou

WOOD PILE
Russia unveils own 'almost Android' system

China's Baidu to invest $1.6 bn in cloud computing

Samsung violates Chinese workers' rights: report

Apple event invites hint at iPhone 5 debut

WOOD PILE
Coral scientists use new model to find where corals are most likely to survive climate change

Increased Sediment and Nutrients Delivered to Bay as Susquehanna Reservoirs Near Sediment Capacity

Super-trawler cleared to fish in Australian waters

Viruses Could be the Key to Healthy Corals

WOOD PILE
Major world interests at stake in Canada's vast Mackenzie River Basin

Study suggests large methane reservoirs beneath Antarctic ice sheet

NASA's IceBridge Seeking New View of Changing Sea Ice

Netherlands: Arctic energy rules needed

WOOD PILE
Discovery may help protect crops from stressors

Uncoiling the cucumber's enigma

Brazil's Rousseff vows to stand firm on environment defense

World can increase food supply, study says

WOOD PILE
Dakar floods uncover ancient tools, jewellery: researchers

Scripps Researchers Pinpoint Hot Spots as Earthquake Trigger Points

Hundreds of homes damaged in Philippines quake

Earthquake Hazards Map Study Finds Deadly Flaws, MU Researcher Suggests Improvements

WOOD PILE
Liberia gets Norwegian security training

Uganda seizes LRA munitions

AMISOM troops retake Somalia's Marka port

Sudan, South Sudan dispute Abyei region

WOOD PILE
DNA of ancient human decoded

Electronics, living tissue, merged in lab

Man mistakes son for monkey, shoots him dead

More Clues About Why Chimps and Humans Are Genetically Different




The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2014 - Space Media Network. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement