Apkindo criticizes new logging system

JAKARTA (JP): The government's decision to authorize provincial administrations to grant logging contracts to cooperatives and small companies could open up opportunities for corruption, the Association of Indonesian Wood Panel Producers (Apkindo) warned on Monday.

Apkindo's executive director, A. Tjipto Wignjoprajitno, said that if corrupt and collusive practices were involved in the granting of logging contracts, the country's forests would suffer. He explained that loggers acquiring concessions in this manner might be neither qualified nor responsible enough to manage the forests appropriately.

"We fear that the move will open possibilities for corruption and collusion between local administrations and parties which are not qualified to manage forests in an environmentally sustainable manner," he said in a news conference.

"So we need tighter supervision and regulation to ensure that no collusion will happen."

Minister of Forestry and Plantations Muslimin Nasution said last week that the government would grant logging contracts for one million hectares of forests to cooperatives and small businesses. He said this was to give more people a share in the management of the country's forest resources.

Muslimin said the forest areas to be granted to each small operator would be limited to 10,000 hectares.

Provincial administrations will have the authority to grant logging contracts for the areas less than 10,000 hectares. Muslimin said this was part of the central government's efforts to give local administrations greater autonomy in managing the country's forests.

Local cooperatives applying for logging contracts should have approval from the provincial governor, he said.

Of the one million hectares of forests to be contracted to small operators, it is expected there will be about 1,500 concessions with areas less than 10,000 hectares each.

In the past, big timber companies managed millions of hectares of forest.

Tjipto said it would be hard to control thousands of timber companies to ensure they manage the forests in a sustainable fashion.

"It is not the number of the concessions that we fear, but the supervision of them," he said, adding that there were over 10 million small timber companies operating in the United States.

"But the U.S government's supervision of timber management is definitely better than here," he said.

To ensure the forests are managed with a high degree of sustainability, he said Apkindo had suggested the government establish an independent timber exchange in plywood producing areas.

He said timber traded in the exchange would have to have a transportation letter to guarantee that the logs were felled in a sustainable manner.

"By establishing a wood exchange, the log supply will be easier to control because we know the amount of timber traded. But the exchange should be independent," he said. (gis)