From: Glen Barry
Subject: BIOD: Illegal Logging in Guyana
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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS
Illegal Logging Discovered in Guyana
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Forest Networking a Project of Ecological Enterprises
http://forests.org/
4/26/98
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by EE
The Guyanese/Malaysian-owned UNAMCO timber company has been flagrantly
violating the laws of Guyana. They illegally commenced logging prior
to being given approval and are building logging roads without an
Environmental Impact Assessment. Asian logging companies which have
devastated Sarawak, Malaysia's forests, left much of Indonesian
smouldering, aggressively destroyed the Solomon Islands forest
ecosystem and have now been thrown out, and are in full boom in Papua
New Guinea are now revving up to take out the Guyanese and Amazon
rainforest expanses. Predatory logging is not a pretty sight; doing
little to improve the lot of local peoples, and leaving a legacy of
destroyed forest ecosystems and shredded biodiversity, which preclude
even an adequate subsistence base in the future. A handful of
companies are threatening the biological heritage of the world's
rainforests with totally inappropriate predatory logging.
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Title: Illegal Logging Discovered in Guyana
Source: Forest Peoples Programme of World Rainforest Movement
Status: Distribute freely with credit given to source
Date: April 20, 1998
/** rainfor.genera: 80.0 **/
** Topic: ILLEGAL LOGGING DISCOVERED IN GUYANA **
** Written 4:05 AM Apr 23, 1998 by gn:wrm in cdp:rainfor.genera **
FOREST PEOPLES PROGRAMME
Guyana Information Update
20 April,1998
Illegal Logging Discovered in Guyana
While inspecting a logging road in November 1997, an officer of the
Guyana Forestry Commission discovered that Guyanese/Malaysian-owned,
UNAMCO, had been logging its concession without permission. Less than
a week after the discovery of this illegal logging, the President of
Guyana held a ceremony to open the main logging road in the
concession, despite the fact that the EIA on the road had been
rejected as inadequate by the Environmental Protection Agency. The
EIA for the road still had not been approved in April 1998.
It was later confirmed that UNAMCO had cut at least 15,000 trees
illegally and was operating without approval for its Environmental
Impact Assessment for the logging concession, Forest Management Plan
and Operations Plan. This is also illegal in Guyana. The company was
fined a paltry US$7,142 by a special government committee established
to investigate the situation. The estimated value of the illegally
felled trees is US$6.75 million. UNAMCO owes the government US$37,142
in outstanding acreage fees on other concessions. These arrears date
back to the beginning of 1997. UNAMCO claims that it has not made a
Guyana cent from its operations in Guyana for the past three years.
The illegal logging activity took place either in a 237,000 acre
Timber Sales Agreement concession held by UNAMCO since 1992 or in one
of the controversial Exploratory Leases issued by the Government.
There are conflicting reports in both the media and from the
Government concerning exactly where the illegal activity took place.
UNAMCO, which is owned by Guyanese company, Case Timbers (15%) and
Malaysian company, Tenaga Khemas in the name of Villupillai
Kanagalingan (85%), was recently granted an Exploratory Lease of
345,000 hectares. An Exploratory Lease permits each company to make an
inventory of commercial timber, develop necessary infrastructure and
write a management plan to be submitted to the Government. It does
not permit logging for commercial purposes. The legislation
authorizing Exploratory Leases was passed in July 1997 over the
objections of opposition parties, Indigenous peoples and
environmentalists who urged that the law be withdrawn. The opposition
parties accused the Government of moving with undue haste, of not
consulting with Indigenous peoples and said that the law "reeked of
collusion, conflict of interest and corruption."
Case Timbers, which is also 80% owned by Tenaga Khemas, is scheduled
to get an Exploratory Lease of 500,000 acres contiguous with its
existing concession of 154,000 acres and an existing concession held
by UNAMCO, which is 237,000 acres. On July 21, 1997, Case signed a
Memorandum of Understanding with the government for the construction
of a US$40 million plywood plant. The plant, which is estimated to
produce 7000 cubic metres of plywood per month is expected to be
operational by the end of 1998.
Villupillai Kanagalingan, the head of Tenaga Khemas has openly
admitted that he holds his interest in both Case and UNAMCO for the
notorious Malaysian company, Berjaya Berhad. Both Case and UNAMCO are
working jointly with Berjaya in existing concessions in Guyana.
Berjaya, which was expelled from the Solomon Islands from attempting
to bribe a government official, will also get an Exploratory Lease of
780,000 hectares in the recently extended state forest lands in
Southern Guyana. State forests were extended by 11.3 million acres in
1997 to allow for Exploratory Leases for Malaysian companies, Solid
Timbers and Kwitaro (Mafira Group), each of which received 780,000
hectares, in addition to Berjaya's 780,000 hectares. Berjaya
therefore holds either in its own name or through its interests in
Case and UNAMCO somewhere around 2 million hectares of forestry
concessions in Guyana.
Berjaya has connections with Malaysian conglomerate, Ribunan Hijau,
that has been responsible for the systematic abuse of environmental
and forestry laws in Papua New Guinea. Rimbunan Hijau is suspected to
be the owner of at least one other company obtaining an Exploratory
Lease in Guyana and is also rumored to have interests in the Prime
Group, another company with logging concessions in Guyana.
Consequently, it is possible that Ribunan Hijau is the secret holder
of a large percentage of the timber concessions in Guyana.
The government of Guyana estimates that present (reported) logging
rates of 240,000 cubic metres per annum is expected to increase to 1
million cubic metres within the next 3-5 years. It cites the
Exploratory Leases as an example of its commitment to sustainable
development and management of its tropical forests. However, as the
UNAMCO case illustrates, the opposition of Indigenous peoples and
environmentalists was justified as the companies involved cannot be
trusted to follow the law and as the government is incapable, if not
unwilling, to monitor the companies operations and enforce the law in
a meaningful way. Illegal activity in the UNAMCO concession was
discovered only by accident and the fine levied hardly indicates that
the government is intent on deterring further violations. Not only
has UNAMCO not paid its dues for over a year on existing concessions
and violated the law on more than one count, the government will also
give Exploratory Leases to another company (Case Timbers) with
identical ownership to UNAMCO and to Berjaya, which holds a majority
interest in both of these companies.
Since the fine was announced, UNAMCO has aggressively tried to have
the Guyana Forestry Commission removed from any further dealings with
the matter. In a letter to the President of Guyana, UNAMCO's director
described relations between his company and the GFC as "critical." He
urged the president to intervene directly and "decisively" to resolve
the dispute. A meeting with the president was held in early March,
but the decisions made there have not been made public. A week later,
the Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Roger Luncheon, stated that
the President and the Government solidly back UNAMCO's operations and
investment in Guyana's forests. Referring to criticism of UNAMCO by
the media, Luncheon said, "People don't recognise how negative an
impact this could have on our economic development if they (UNAMCO)
decide to abandon Guyana." Luncheon went on to say that the UNAMCO
incident had to viewed in the context of a number of collateral issues
including, "a well orchestrated campaign to discredit Malaysian
investors in the forestry sector; the fact that other operators in the
local industry are guilty of similar or more serious transgressions
and that UNAMCO's relations with the GFC were very rocky."
As stated in an editorial in Guyanese newspaper, the Starbroek News,
"The intervention by President Janet Jagan effectively took the issue
out of the ambit of the GFC and the Minister responsible for forestry.
It sent a signal that big forestry operators could bypass essential
requirements set out by the GFC by appealing directly to the head of
government. It thereby undermines the authority of the GFC which has
sweeping and onerous obligations in acting as conservator of forests
and ensuring that operators abide by the tenants of good forestry
practice." The GFC is weak and understaffed as it is, if it has to
constantly worry about logging companies undermining its authority by
running to the President it will never have the credibility or
authority needed to ensure that logging operations are conducted
sustainably. The response of the government of Guyana speaks volumes
about where its priorities lie. It is willing to appease a logging
company fined for illegal activities in the name of national
development when the company involved claims to not make any money and
is over a year behind in paying its dues to the national treasury.
Moreover, it is unclear whether UNAMCO has paid or intends to pay the
fine levied against it.
In addition to claims about the sustainability of logging Guyana, the
government also claims that logging activities take place with due
regard for the rights of Indigenous peoples in Guyana. It says that
"legitimate" Indigenous lands are not included in logging areas.
"Legitimate" Indigenous lands in Guyana are those recognized by the
government. Many communities in Guyana remain without recognized
rights to their lands and those that do have them almost unanimously
state that these lands are inadequate for basic subsistence purposes
and do not correspond to the full extent of their ancestral lands.
They point out that the Amerindian Lands Commission, established as a
condition of Guyana's independence to identify Indigenous lands,
recommended that title be granted to 24,000 square miles out of 43,000
square miles identified by Indigenous peoples as theirs. To date, the
government has recognized title to less than 6000 square miles, or
less than a quarter of that recommended by the Commission and about
one-seventh of that identified by Indigenous peoples as theirs. In
short, logging does take place on Indigenous lands in Guyana.
The government also points to efforts to demarcate Indigenous lands as
evidence of its commitment to ensure that Indigenous lands is
safeguarded from logging operations. It does not say, however, that
Indigenous peoples throughout Guyana have rejected government
demarcation as arbitrary and imposed and have demanded that all
outstanding land issues, including titles for communities without them
and title extensions for others, are addressed prior to demarcation.
Indigenous communities have even chased government surveyors off their
lands to ensure that their lands are demarcated according to their
rights under international law rather than by government definitions.
The government also does not say that it routinely ignores Indigenous
communities when granting concessions for both logging and mining. It
does not consult with affected communities, let alone seek their
approval.
According to the Amerindian Peoples Association, Guyana's primary
Indigenous organization, "The recent case of the UNAMCO highlights the
inadequacy of the GFC to monitor logging operations. If this
situation has been taking place with UNAMCO and has only now been
found out, how many other irregular activities are taking place in
other concessions throughout Guyana. These concessions were granted
without Amerindian participation, without regard for Amerindian land
and other rights and as illustrated by this case, these companies are
abusing the forest on which many Amerindians depend for their basic
livelihood. The Wapisiana people in Region 9 have previously expressed
concerns about an exploratory lease given to Malaysian company,
Kwitaro that includes their ancestral lands. In light of these events,
the APA once again calls upon the Government to halt logging
operations, until the rights of Amerindians to own and control their
ancestral territories and forest resources are fully recognized in
accordance with international law."
For further information please contact,
Forest Peoples Programme
1c, Fosseway Business Centre
Stratford Road
Moreton-in-Marsh, GL56 9NQ
United Kingdom
Tel. 44. 1608. 652. 893.
Fax. 44. 1608. 652. 878
Email : wrm@gn.apc.org
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