Vietnam now a hub of illegal timber trade

Vietnam has become a hub for processing huge quantities of unlawfully-logged timber from across Indochina, threatening some of the last intact forests in the region, a detailed investigation has revealed.

Undercover investigations by the UK-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and Indonesian NGO Telapak have discovered how Vietnam’s booming economy and demand for cheap furniture in the West is driving rapid deforestation throughout the Mekong river region.

Much of the illegally-imported wood is made into furniture for export to garden centres and merchants in the UK.

Field investigations in Vietnam and neighbouring Laos, including secret filming and undercover visits to furniture factories, have demonstrated that although some countries like Indonesia have cracked down on the illegal timber trade, criminal networks have now shifted their attention to looting the vanishing forests of Laos.

This illicit trade is in direct contravention of laws in Laos banning the export of logs and sawn timber and EIA/Telapak are calling for urgent international action.

Truck convoys

Investigators visited numerous Vietnamese furniture factories and found the majority to be using logs from Laos. In the Vietnamese port of Vinh, they witnessed piles of huge logs from Laos awaiting sale.

At one border crossing on one occasion alone, 45 trucks laden with logs were filmed lining up to cross the Laos border into Vietnam.

The report estimates at least 500,000 cubic metres of logs are moved in this way every year.

Since the 1990s, Vietnam has taken steps to protect to conserve its remaining forests while at the same time, massively expanding its wooden furniture production.

Stolen timber

Vietnam has an unenviable track record in using stolen timber. Past investigations have revealed it laundering illegal timber from both Cambodia and Indonesia..

The plundering of Laos’ forests involves high-level corruption and bribery and it is not just Vietnam which is exploiting its neighbour; Thai and Singapore traders are also cashing in.

Posing as investors, EIA/Telapak investigators met one Thai businessman who bragged of paying bribes to senior Laos military officials to secure timber worth potentially half a billion dollars.

“The cost of such unfettered greed is borne by poor rural communities in Laos who are dependent on the forests for their traditional livelihoods,” said EIA's head of Forests Campaign, Julian Newman.

He said the local people gain virtually nothing from this trade, with corrupt Laos officials and businesses in Vietnam and Thailand, the profiteers.

Growing market

The report concludes that to some extent the dynamic growth of Vietnam’s furniture industry is driven by the demand of end markets like Europe and the US.

“The ultimate responsibility for this dire state of affairs rests with the consumer markets with import wood products made from stolen timber,” said Julian.

“Until these states clean up their act and shut their markets to illegal wood products, the loss of precious tropical forests will continue unabated.”

EIA/Telapak are calling for: better enforcement by the timber-producing and processing countries and new laws banning the import of products and timber derived from illegal logging in the EU and US.

Source: IEA/Telepak report, 19 March 2008

VN wood furniture industry depends on stolen timber from Cambodia, Laos and Indonesia

Vietnam's 2.4-billion-dollar furniture industry using Lao logs

Mar 19, 2008
DPA

Bangkok - Vietnam's booming wood furniture industry, which earned the country 2.4 billion dollars last year, is smuggling an estimated 500,000 cubic metres of illegal timber from neighbouring Laos, environmental groups disclosed Wednesday.

Vietnam, whose wood furniture exports have increased ten-fold since 2000, has shifted from using illegal timber from Cambodia, Laos and Indonesia over the past seven years, according to investigations conducting by the UK-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) with Indonesian non-governmental organization Telapak.

'Vietnam has an unenviable track record when it comes to dealing in stolen timber,' said the latest EIA/Telapak report on the illegal timber trade in South-east Asia called 'Borderlines - Vietnam's Booming Industry and Timber Smuggling in Mekong Region.

Previous reports have uncovered illegal timber smuggling to Vietnam, from neighbouring Cambodia in the late 1990s, and smuggled shipments from Indonesia in 2003.

Since 2005, Vietnam's furniture industry has increasingly shifted to supplies from neighbouring Laos, one of the world's poorest countries.

'Based on our field observations, EIA/Telepak estimate that at least 500,000 cubic metres of logs move from Laos to Vietnam every year,' said Julian Newman, EIA's head of forests campaign.

The illicit trade in timber between Laos and Vietnam is worth an estimated 250 million dollars a year, and translates into huge export earnings for Vietnam, which now ranks among the world's major wooden furniture exporters.

Thai and Singaporean companies are complicit in the trade, having won dubious logging concessions from Laos, although the communist state has had a ban on raw timber exports for more than a decade.

EIA/Telapak filmed at interview with Thai businessman Prakit Sribussaracum, owner of the LVT International Company, in which he admits to having paid bribes to Lao officials to secure the timbering concession in eastern Laos.

'I pay government people, I pay every step,' Prakit said in a recorded interview with investigators posing as buyers.

The two organizations called for more legislation in Europe and the United States to ban imports of wood furniture that are sourced with illegal wood.

'We would like to see Europe enact some legislation to prevent illegal-sourced timber wood products from entering the market,' said Faith Doherty, EIA's political coordinator.

But she admitted that it was difficult to determine the origin of most wood products, given the 'laundering' process that documentation goes through.

There has been progress made, however, in pressuring Vietnam to improve the transparency of its furniture sourcing, she said.

'At the moment, the European Union has requested informal negotations with Vietnam to try to tackle this problem,' Doherty said. 'Vietnam has an opportunity to step up and show it is willing to address its consumption and its porcessing of the illegal supply its relies on.'