About  |   Contact  |  Mongabay on Facebook  |  Mongabay on Twitter  |  Subscribe
Rainforests | Tropical fish | Environmental news | Blog | For kids | Madagascar | Photos | Non-English languages | Tropical Conservation Science | Jobs
SHARE:




Malaysia to use certification to crack down on illegal logging
mongabay.com
March 27, 2007




Malaysia will ask its timber suppliers in other countries to provide certification on the origin of wood according to a report from the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO). The move will help Malaysia fight allegations that its timber processors are complicit in the illegal logging industry.

The ITTO says the decision will boost sales of Malaysian secondary processed wood products to markets where timber accountability is important, like Europe and increasingly, the United States.

Malaysian Minister of Plantation Industries and Commodities, Datuk Peter Chin, said that certification will "ensure that Malaysia was not accidentally purchasing smuggled or illegally-logged timber." He added that under the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA), currently being negotiated between the European Union (EU) and Malaysia, "European countries should make sure that they purchased timber and timber-based products from countries that practiced sustainable forest management." Further, he said, European countries should be willing to pay more for certified timber since production costs would be higher for manufacturers.


Rainforest in Malaysia
Green groups have long accused Malaysian timber firms of participating in illegal logging operations in other countries as well as smuggling illicitly harvest timber, especially from Indonesia. In recent years the country has taken steps to tackle this problem on a domestic level, toughening prison sentences for illegal loggers and developing a remote sensing technology to detect illegal logging and forest fires. Still Malaysia's annual deforestation rate accelerated by 86 percent between the close of 1990s and the 2000-2005 period. The country lost an average of 140,200 hectares -- 0.65 percent of its forest area -- per year since 2000 according to official figures. Forest cover has fallen dramatically in Malaysia since the 1970s. While the United Nations says that forests still cover more than 60% of the country, less than 12 percent of these forests are considered pristine.





This article used information from an ITTO bulletin

Comments?



News options



CITATION:
mongabay.com (March 27, 2007). Malaysia to use certification to crack down on illegal logging. http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0327-timber.html


Tags:
forestry rainforests forests asia malaysia illegal logging deforestation sustainable forest management certification saving rainforests rainforest conservation threats to the rainforest Rainforest deforestation timber logging happy-upbeat environmental environment green

print


News index | RSS | News Feed | Twitter | Home


Advertisements:


Organic Apparel from Patagonia | Insect-repelling clothing




Mongabay Store
Wildlife of Madagascar T-shirt
Wildlife of Madagascar T-shirt
Bold and Dangerous - Pygmy tyrant t-shirts
Bold and Dangerous - Pygmy tyrant
Love me before I'm gone - Gladiator frog t-shirts
Love me before I'm gone - Gladiator frog
Licking this frog may make you crazy t-shirts
Licking this frog may make you crazy





WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
Email:





SUPPORT
Mongabay.com seeks to raise interest in and appreciation of wild lands and wildlife, while examining the impact of emerging trends in climate, technology, economics, and finance on conservation and development (more)

Help support mongabay.com when you buy from Amazon.com



POPULAR PAGES
Rainforests
Rain forests
Amazon deforestation
Deforestation
Deforestation stats
Why rainforests matter
Saving rainforests
Deforestation stats
Rainforest canopy

News
Most popular articles
Worth saving?
Forest conservation
Earth Day
Poverty alleviation
Cell phones in Africa
Seniors helping Africa
Saving orangutans in Borneo
Palm oil
Amazon palm oil
Future of the Amazon
Cane toads
Dubai environment
Investing to save rainforests
Visiting the rainforest
Biomimicry
Defaunation
Blue lizard
Amazon fires
Extinction debate
Extinction crisis
Blackwashing
Industrial deforestation
Save the Amazon
Rainforests & REDD
Brazil's Amazon plan
Malaysian palm oil
Avatar story
New Guinea
Sulawesi
Amazon ranching
Madagascar
Borneo

News topics
Amazon
Biofuels
Brazil
Carbon Finance
Conservation
Climate Change
Deforestation
Energy
Happy-upbeat
Indonesia
Interviews
Oceans
Palm oil
Rainforests
REDD
Solutions
Wildlife
MORE TOPICS



Non-English Sites
Chinese
French
German
Greek
Indonesian
Italian
Portuguese
Spanish
Other languages

Nature Blog Network









Photos
Alaska photos
Alaska

Argentina photos
Argentina

Australia photos
Australia

Belize photos
Belize

Brazil photos
Brazil

Cambodia photos
Cambodia

China photos
China

Colombia photos
Colombia

Costa Rica photos
Costa Rica

Deforestation photos
Deforestation

Frog photos
Frog

Gabon photos
Gabon

Grand Canyon photos
Grand Canyon

Honduras photos
Honduras

India photos
India

Indonesia photos
Indonesia

Kenya photos
Kenya

Laos photos
Laos

Lemur photos
Lemur

Madagascar photos
Madagascar

Malaysia photos
Malaysia

Monkey photos
Monkey

New Zealand photos
New Zealand

Panama photos
Panama

Peru photos
Peru

Peru photos
Rainforest


Sunset

Suriname photos
Suriname

Tanzania photos
Tanzania

Thailand photos
Thailand

Uganda photos
Uganda

United States photos
United States

Venezuela photos
Venezuela



HIGH RESOLUTION PHOTOS / PRINTS


CALENDARS
  • Mount Kenya
  • East Africa Safari Wildlife
  • Kenya's Turkana People
  • Peru
  • African Wildlife
  • Alaska
  • China
  • Madagascar Chameleons


    CANVAS BAGS

  • Hallucinogenic frog bag
  • Madagascar wildlife bag








  • Copyright mongabay 2010

    Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions generated from mongabay.com operations (server, data transfer, travel) are mitigated through an association with Anthrotect,
    an organization working with Afro-indigenous and Embera communities to protect forests in Colombia's Darien region.
    Anthrotect is protecting the habitat of mongabay's mascot: the scale-crested pygmy tyrant.