Washington, May 14 : A new study has determined that Vietnam has become a hub for processing Asia's illegally logged timber, much of which is being sold in the US as outdoor furniture.
According to a report in National Geographic News, the Mekong region, which includes Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Burma, and China, has some of the most valuable and vulnerable tree species sought by the international timber trade, including rosewood, keruing, teak, and yellow balau.
"One of the biggest shifts in the timber industry in Asia over the last decade or so has been the emergence of a huge wood-processing industry in China and Vietnam," said Julian Newman, head of the EIA's forest campaign program.
In a report released in March, the UK-based nonprofit Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and its Indonesian partner Telapak have already warned that the illegal timber trade is threatening some of the last intact forests in Southeast Asia, especially in Laos.
EIA estimates that the illegal logging business, which the agency says is orchestrated by cross-border criminal syndicates working with corrupt officials, costs developing countries some 10 billion to 15 billion US dollars a year.
Around 60 percent of the trade in tropical timber moves between the countries of southern and eastern Asia, according to EIA.
"Despite wide awareness of the problem of illegal logging and a series of political commitments to tackle the issue, demand for cut-price wood products is still fuelling the illegal destruction of some of the world's most significant remaining tropical forests," said Newman.
A rise in timber prices has prompted some wood-producing countries, such as Indonesia, to clamp down on illegal logging.
Other countries, such as China and Vietnam, have taken measures to sharply reduce all logging of their own forests, while importing timber from neighboring countries for their growing timber-processing industries.
Though it is currently legal in the United States to import illegally sourced wood products, but legislation now under consideration in the US Congress would ban imports of wood products derived from illegally harvested timber.
According to a report in National Geographic News, the Mekong region, which includes Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Burma, and China, has some of the most valuable and vulnerable tree species sought by the international timber trade, including rosewood, keruing, teak, and yellow balau.
"One of the biggest shifts in the timber industry in Asia over the last decade or so has been the emergence of a huge wood-processing industry in China and Vietnam," said Julian Newman, head of the EIA's forest campaign program.
In a report released in March, the UK-based nonprofit Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and its Indonesian partner Telapak have already warned that the illegal timber trade is threatening some of the last intact forests in Southeast Asia, especially in Laos.
EIA estimates that the illegal logging business, which the agency says is orchestrated by cross-border criminal syndicates working with corrupt officials, costs developing countries some 10 billion to 15 billion US dollars a year.
Around 60 percent of the trade in tropical timber moves between the countries of southern and eastern Asia, according to EIA.
"Despite wide awareness of the problem of illegal logging and a series of political commitments to tackle the issue, demand for cut-price wood products is still fuelling the illegal destruction of some of the world's most significant remaining tropical forests," said Newman.
A rise in timber prices has prompted some wood-producing countries, such as Indonesia, to clamp down on illegal logging.
Other countries, such as China and Vietnam, have taken measures to sharply reduce all logging of their own forests, while importing timber from neighboring countries for their growing timber-processing industries.
Though it is currently legal in the United States to import illegally sourced wood products, but legislation now under consideration in the US Congress would ban imports of wood products derived from illegally harvested timber.
4 comments:
the world's consumers are so ignorant about the raw materials came out of cambodia like the woods for making furniture the vietnam may have export for sale overseas. and this is one of many such misconception that everything vietnam produced were actually came from cambodia. i think the world community need to understand that and not thinking that vietnam is rich in raw materials or what have you. please know the facts. i hope cambodia will turn it around soon to have furniture and its raw materials being processed in its own countries; this is important as the world are so ignorant about cambodia.
This is exactly why we need to get rid Ah troublemaker Xam Rainxy.
If you know history and culture the Viet is reponsible all bad thing in the Mekong delta!
With new technologies the Viet will be the evile of the modern world!
Don't worry vietnam. You comunist soon will be hung just like saddam hussen.
The US alway gets the devil, and hung them like what happen to saddam.
vietnam, big daddy McCain coming to get you for the vietnam war.
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