Earthsight
recently published a report on corruption in the European timber industry and
the purchasing of illegal timber from Ukraine by Europe. The report focused on
the illegal logging happening in the ecologically important and sensitive
regions that support some of our continents most endangered wildlife.
Earthsight spent two years
investigating how illegal logging in the region was fueling corruption
throughout Eastern Europe and corruption within Ukraine itself. The EU
purchased 1 billion Euros of timber in 2017 from the region which represents
70% of all the illegal timber that is harvested. Of that, 40% of the timber
from the region is illegal and was harvested in ecologically sensitive areas.
Ukraine is the largest single supplier of such high-risk wood to the EU,
exceeding all of the tropical countries of Latin America, Africa, and SE Asia
combined.
The report pointed out sadly that this
was commonplace and was occurring without much protest or intervention by the
EU to uphold the EUTR of 2013. They also found that most of this wood was FSC
certified despite being harvested illegally. Earthsight commented that this was
prevalent due to the lack of due diligence by the FSC and timber companies who
were not checking where their wood comes from or performing any independent
audits.
This story is similar to others across
the continent where issues with illegal logging and irresponsible timber
harvesting practises are prevalent.
Romania,
for example, is one of the largest areas of primeval forests that are left in
Europe with 200,000 hectors of vegan forests still remaining in the
Carpathians. This is a very important area biologically and ecologically not
just because it is one of the last strongholds of European wolf's bears and
lynx but also for the important microflora and fauna in the soils of the
region. Europe is subject to large areas of soil erosion and degradation due to
deforestation and agricultural practises.
However, this important region is now
being commercially logged with little to no opposition from the government or
EU.
This story was also repeated recently
in Poland who has been logging in the ancient Bialwieza
forest regardless of it being deemed illegal by the EU and being a UNESCO world
heritage site and one of the last remaining strongholds of European Bison.
Although there has been an increase in right-wing parties and nationalism in Eastern Europe, that should not jeopardize the preservation of the natural world, environmentalism should be excluded from politics. Our landscape nature and environment is part of our cultural heritage and this should be protected regardless of the political situation.
Here in the UK we have extreme issues with deforestation which are largely ignored. We currently only have 13% forest cover resulting in high levels of air pollution soil erosion, less productive arable land and most of all issues with flooding. Supporting woodland charities here like the Woodland Trust RSPB, Trees for Cities, Grown in Britain etc. should be a priority; as well as putting pressure on the Government.
