Jacques Ngoun is one of the 'Pygmies' of Cameroon. His people, the Bagyeli, are in danger; their forest is being invaded, and the hunting and gathering on which they depend ruined, by logging companies and settlers.
Bulletin articles
Rainforests in the centre and northern regions of Congo Democratic Republic (ex-Zaire) occupy more than half of the country's total area of 2,345,409 square kilometres and represent 82.5% of the original forest cover. About 47% of the whole dense tropical forests of Africa and 6% of the Planet's forests are in Congo DR.
The World Bank first and the Hutu-Tutsi civil war later have led the Batwa pigmies to near extinction and years of suffering, without this being reported by the world mass media.
The Timberwatch Coalition of South Africa is organizing a symposium -that will take place on June 10th in the city of Pietermaritzburg- to discuss the issue of timber plantations. These constitute a cause of concern in that country since they are occupying vast areas of grassland -and are still expanding- provoking negative social and environmental impacts (see WRM Bulletins 7, 22, 23 and 26).
A recent report on sustainable forest management in Cambodia, funded by the Asian Development Bank, has prompted the discussion of this important issue among stakeholders. The report states that the management of the country's forests is a "total systems failure" since "at the current level of cut every concession will be logged out within seven years", and recommends immediate reforms.
A research recently performed on oil palm plantations in Indonesia studies the past and future trends of the sector, reveals its effects on the country's economy, local communities and forests and proposes recommendations to this regard.
For years, the Dayak indigenous peoples of Sarawak have been defending their forests and livelihoods from the depredatory activities of logging, oil palm and eucalyptus plantations promoted by the Malaysian and the Sarawak state governments. In an unequal struggle, local communities -supported by Malaysian and international social and environmental NGOs- have been resisting the destruction of their forests and the installation of plantations.
Thailand’s villagers are fighting to prevent a 120,000 hectares (ha) eucalyptus plantation project that would lead to widespread forest clearance and threatens the farming livelihoods of hundreds of rural communities in eight eastern and northeastern provinces.
Together with the alarming destruction of primary forests in tropical South and Central America, in Costa Rica something positive is happening: an increase in the area of secondary forests, which are those that are starting to regenerate after having suffered a degradation process. These forests have a great potential for the production wood and non-wood products, as well as in the provision of environmental services.
Every event happening in Brazil in relation to forests can be considered important, taking into account its huge area, the diversity of forests present in its territory, and the opposing interests at stake.
In spite of the experiences accumulated during all these years with regard to the damages caused by large-scale tree plantations, the draft bill of the so-called Special Law for Sustainable Forestry Development in Ecuador is inspired in the Chilean legislation of the 1970s, which has been the model for the legal framework that regulates forestry activities in other South American countries. Such model is based precisely on the promotion of tree plantations, while forests occupy a secondary place in importance.