Illegal wood exports to China tripled in 2013
Cambodia’s exports of protected rosewood and other high-value timber to China more than tripled last year, according to U.N. figures cited in a new report that blames lax law enforcement across the Mekong region and skyrocketing demand in China for pushing some species to the brink of extinction. The trade can be deadly. At least 33 Cambodians were shot dead by Thai security forces while searching for the lucrative lumber across the border last year alone, according to rights group Adhoc. The illicit cross-border trade cost 45 Cambodians their lives the year before. In a report released Monday, “Routes of Extinction: The corruption and violence destroying Siamese rosewood in the Mekong,” the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) blames the illicit trade mostly on China’s love for Hongmu, its word for a type of high-end furniture and the species of wood used to make it. … Of the 3.5 million cubic meters of Hongmu timber China imported between 2000 and 2013, nearly half came from Cambodia and the rest of the Mekong region, according to the EIA’s analysis of U.N. trade data. According to the data, Cambodia’s exports of rosewood and other Hongmu species more than tripled between 2012 and 2013 from 6,800 cubic meters to 20,700 cubic meters, the highest figure on record for the country since 2000. … Cambodia’s 2002 Forestry Law strictly prohibits the logging of rare tree species, including rosewood. In 2013, Prime Minister Hun Sen issued a directive outlawing not just the logging of rosewood, but its transport and sale as well. He also urged countries still importing the wood to act to stem demand. That same year, Cambodia joined 176 other countries party to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) to give Siamese rosewood Appendix II protection. That means all international trade of the species must now be accompanied by a specific export license. … The CITES website lists Cambodia’s “management authority” for the convention as Ty Sokhun, a secretary of state at the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. Mr. Sokhun declined to speak. His assistant referred questions on rosewood exports to Forestry Administration chief Chheng Kim Sun, who also declined to speak. … EIA cites a $3.4 million deal Cambodian timber tycoon Try Pheap inked with the government for 5,000 cubic meters of illegally logged wood seized by authorities last year. In the country’s northeast, it is an open secret among loggers and rights groups that Mr. Pheap’s loaded trucks make constant trips into nearby Vietnam. …
Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/illegal-wood-exports-to-china-tripled-in-2013-58593/
