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)