World Bank, WWF and others are wrong on old-growth logging
FORESTS ALERT: World Bank Subsidies Threaten World's Second Largest Rainforest
ACTION ALERT UPDATE
World Bank Subsidies Threaten World's Second Largest Rainforest
By Forests.org
August 25, 2004
TAKE ACTION - just updated!!
World Bank, WWF and others are wrong on old-growth logging
http://forests.org/action/africa/
In March, 2004 the Rainforest Foundation revealed that the World Bank and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) seek to increase logging by sixty times in the world's second largest intact rainforest found mostly in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). According to World Bank documents, they intend to "create a favorable climate for industrial logging" by subsidizing the development of comprehensive new forestry laws in the Congo, as well as the 'zoning' of the country's entire forest area.
At $0.06 per hectare per year, the Bank-approved leasing of DRC's rainforests to loggers surely warrants scrutiny to determine whether this represents the true global value of those forests. Joseph Bobia, spokesperson for the Congolese development organization CENADEP, fears that as a result of industrial logging "much of the country [will be] turned into a vast logging concession."
Hundreds of environment, development, and human rights groups in the Congo, and thousands of international supporters including Forests.org's network, have called on the World Bank to stop these plans. What had been a surreptitious effort to access cheap timber in the absence of governmental authority has become a major international issue. The World Bank's President has gotten involved, and there are indications the project may be cancelled. The World Bank continues to subsidize first time industrial development of old-growth and other endangered forests in the DRC and around the world - seriously damaging the local and global environments.
Please demand the World Bank and FAO immediately halt plans for the expansion of industrial logging in the Democratic Republic of Congo and remaining ancient forests around the World.
Let them know the World Bank should be working with the Congolese government to help dismantle the country's corrupt and inefficient logging industry, rather than expanding it, and developing alternatives that will bring direct benefits to, and strengthens the rights of, the 35 million people living in and around the forest and depending on it for their survival.
TAKE ACTION - http://forests.org/action/africa/
P.S. The World Bank and WWF work as an alliance promoting "environmentally sensitive" first time logging of ancient old-growth forests worldwide. Please take the time to respond to the second alert (where you will be forwarded after sending the first), confronting WWF's complicity in final loss of the world's ancient forests. Demand to know where is the evidence old-growth forest can be sustainably managed?
Networked by Forests.org, Inc., gbarry@forests.org
ACTION ALERT UPDATE
World Bank Subsidies Threaten World's Second Largest Rainforest
By Forests.org
August 25, 2004
TAKE ACTION - just updated!!
World Bank, WWF and others are wrong on old-growth logging
http://forests.org/action/africa/
In March, 2004 the Rainforest Foundation revealed that the World Bank and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) seek to increase logging by sixty times in the world's second largest intact rainforest found mostly in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). According to World Bank documents, they intend to "create a favorable climate for industrial logging" by subsidizing the development of comprehensive new forestry laws in the Congo, as well as the 'zoning' of the country's entire forest area.
At $0.06 per hectare per year, the Bank-approved leasing of DRC's rainforests to loggers surely warrants scrutiny to determine whether this represents the true global value of those forests. Joseph Bobia, spokesperson for the Congolese development organization CENADEP, fears that as a result of industrial logging "much of the country [will be] turned into a vast logging concession."
Hundreds of environment, development, and human rights groups in the Congo, and thousands of international supporters including Forests.org's network, have called on the World Bank to stop these plans. What had been a surreptitious effort to access cheap timber in the absence of governmental authority has become a major international issue. The World Bank's President has gotten involved, and there are indications the project may be cancelled. The World Bank continues to subsidize first time industrial development of old-growth and other endangered forests in the DRC and around the world - seriously damaging the local and global environments.
Please demand the World Bank and FAO immediately halt plans for the expansion of industrial logging in the Democratic Republic of Congo and remaining ancient forests around the World.
Let them know the World Bank should be working with the Congolese government to help dismantle the country's corrupt and inefficient logging industry, rather than expanding it, and developing alternatives that will bring direct benefits to, and strengthens the rights of, the 35 million people living in and around the forest and depending on it for their survival.
TAKE ACTION - http://forests.org/action/africa/
P.S. The World Bank and WWF work as an alliance promoting "environmentally sensitive" first time logging of ancient old-growth forests worldwide. Please take the time to respond to the second alert (where you will be forwarded after sending the first), confronting WWF's complicity in final loss of the world's ancient forests. Demand to know where is the evidence old-growth forest can be sustainably managed?
Networked by Forests.org, Inc., gbarry@forests.org
Starmail - 25. Aug, 16:02
