Seminar to discuss tropical forests in 21st century

Seminar to discuss tropical forests in 21st century

JAKARTA (JP): A one-day seminar on "the face of Indonesia's
tropical forests in the 21st century" will be held on June 2 to
commemorate the 25th anniversary of PT International Timber
Corporation Indonesia (ITCI).

Yesterday, an ITCI commissioner, Mohammad (Bob) Hasan
announced that the seminar will discuss the role of forest
resources and forest-based industries in Indonesia's second long-
term development plan. It will also focus on the role of research
in sustainable forest management, timber trade in the 21st
century and profit distribution of tropical timber.

Hasan, who is also chairman of the Indonesian Forestry
Community (MPI), said the seminar is expected to help the
government and private forest concessionaires improve forest
management.

The seminar at the Hilton Hotel in Jakarta will present
distinguished speakers, including Emil Salim, a former minister
of environment, who is now chairman of the Indonesian Eco-
labeling Agency, Klaas W. Kuperus, an international timber
consultant and president of the Netherlands Timber Trade
Association (NTTA), Christopher Elliot, a senior forestry officer
of the World Wide Fund for Nature, Amha Buang, the principal
assistant secretary for forestry and forest industry of the
Malaysian Ministry of General Industries, Jeffrey Sayer, the
president of the Center for International Forestry Research
(Cifor) in Bogor, and Chairman of the National Development
Planning Board (Bappenas) Ginandjar Kartasasmita.

ITCI

ITCI's president, Abbas Adhar, said the company had developed
the country's first timber estate in 1974 before sustainable
forest management became mandatory for the timber industry in
1984.

ITCI's shareholders are the Army's Kartika Eka Pakci
Foundation (50.71 percent), PT Bimantara Citra (33.71 percent),
the Nusamba Group (14.71 percent) and a number of cooperatives
(0.87 percent).

ITCI, which owns a concession of 450,000 hectares in East
Kalimantan, operates a plywood mill with a capacity of 187,600
cubic meters of plywood per year, a saw mill with 36,000 cubic
meters, a molding unit with 24,000 cubic meters and a nursery
producing 20 million seeds per year.

The company's total sales from logging and wood processing
increased from $65 million in 1991 to $69.3 million in 1992 and
$109 million in 1993. (pwn)