I anledning af den internationale skovdag torsdag, skriver UNEP og World Resources Institute om skovenes sociale og økonomiske betydning i kampen mod fattigdom og for en bæredygtig fremtid. De opfordrer til øget engagement for at bekæmpe ulovlig skovhugst og illegal handel med træ.
NAIROBI, 21 March 2013: Our future is inextricably (uløseligt) linked to forests. The social and economic benefits they provide are essential to realising a sustainable century. A key litmus test of our commitment to this future is our response to a growing, global threat: illegal logging and the criminal timber trade.
Forests are vital source of biodiversity and livelihoods. More than 1,6 billion people depend on forests for their livelihoods (levebrød), including 60 million indigenous people who are wholly dependent on forests.
They are also natural carbon storage systems and key allies in combating (bekæmpe) climate change. They are vast (enorme), nature-based water utilities assisting in the storage and release of freshwater to lakes and river networks.
While deforestation is slowing in some places – most notably Brazil – it still remains far too high. The loss of forests is responsible for up to 17 per cent of all human-made greenhouse gas emissions, 50 per cent more than that from ships, aviation (luftfart) and land transport combined.
Organiseret kriminalitet bag handel med ulovligt fældet træ
There is increasing evidence that an important slice of these losses and emissions is linked to illegal logging and organised crime in key tropical countries of the Amazon basin, Congo basin and in south-east Asia.
Indeed, Green Carbon: Black Trade, a recent report by UNEP and Interpol, estimates that illegal activity accounts for 50 to 90 per cent of all logging in these key areas – a criminal trade worth US$30-100bn annually worldwide.
Udbredt korruption og vold
Illegal operations, including bribes (bestikkelse) and even hacking of government databases, are also becoming more sophisticated.
Loggers and dealers quickly shift between regions and countries to avoid local and international policing efforts, laundering (hvidvasker) wood by mixing it with legally cut timber, or passing off wood originating from wild forests as plantation timber.
With the increase in organised criminal activity related to forests, murder is also on the rise. The growing involvement of criminal cartels should be of grave concern for communities, companies, conservationists, and all forest stakeholders.
But there is also good news that may finally help crack down on the criminals and the theft of the natural resources, resources that often are the “GDP of the poor”.
Teknologisk revolution
A final piece to the puzzle may be emerging: rapid, online alerts that deforestation is taking place, particularly in remote (fjerne) locations. Until now, by the time satellite images of deforestation can be viewed, the criminals are often far away.
Cattle are already grazing amidst stumps (stubbe), the illegal oil palm plantation has been established and a company’s financial support for ecosystem services – now degraded (nedslidt) and lost – may already have been paid.
The most recent forest maps of Indonesia, produced from Landsat satellite data, took three years from the time the data was taken to being posted online.
This is not unusual since it typically takes around three to five years to produce a national forest cover map.
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