Pulp producers deny charge on illegal logging

JAKARTA (JP): Pulp and paper producers denied on Monday accusations that they have encouraged illegal logging practices in the country.

Chairman of the Association of Indonesian Pulp and Paper Producers (APKI) Muhammad Mansur said that the charge was groundless.

"Illegal loggers do not sell to us. Illegal logs are good logs and too expensive (for us). We only buy branches and rotten logs," Mansur said on the sidelines of a workshop on illegal logging.

He said that even though the industrial forests owned by the association's members could only supply 40 percent of the 22.5 million cubic meters of timber needed for pulp production a year, the remaining 60 percent had been met by the processing of waste material from logging operations, oil palm plantations, and forest conversion activities.

"The supply is abundant, we are never short of raw material," Mansur asserted.

He said that of the government's allocated 8 million cubic meters of industrial forest land, the industry had so far developed only 1.2 million cubic meters.

"If matured enough (the industrial forest) could yield 30 million cubic meters of logs a year, which is enough to fulfill our needs," Mansur said.

He said it would take three to four years for the trees to mature, and that by 2005 the pulp and paper industry would be self-sufficient.

Kahar Haryopuspito of APKI said there was no need for the industry to encourage illegal logging as the cost of establishing and maintaining an industrial forest was only one tenth of a company's total investment.

"It is very very stupid if a pulp and paper company does not establish an industrial forest," he said.

The pulp and paper industry has been accused of encouraging the practice of illegal logging to fulfill their needs for raw material.

Mubariq Ahmad, a resource economist from the University of Indonesia, said that from 1994 to 1998 Indonesia had lost between 17 million cubic meters and 30 million cubic meters of wood a year due illegal logging activities.

He said that demand for logs from wood-related industries was 37 million cubic meters to 48 million cubic meters a year, while log production itself was only 25 million cubic meters to 28 million cubic meters a year.

"That means some 12 million cubic meters to 20 million cubic meters have been supplied by illegal logging operations," Mubariq said.

He said that one of the reasons for the rampant illegal logging was the growing demand from both local and foreign wood- related industries, but added that banning the export of logs would not solve the problem.

"On the contrary, it would only encourage more log smuggling as the local price for wood would likely fall after the ban," Mubariq said. (10)