In many tropical countries, those that are home to some of the world’s most important forests, up to 90 percent of logging is illegal, fueled by a black market that’s increasingly mob-run. That’s according to a new U.N. report (PDF) that states that illegal logging’s role in deforestation is on the rise.The report, titled “Green Carbon, Black Trade,” makes two key points: Illegal logging is making up a growing proportion of the total world wood industry, and at the same time is becoming a larger factor in global deforestation. The illegal logging trade is centered in those countries with weak regulation and large forest resources, including Brazil and Indonesia. From the report:The vast majority of deforestation and illegal logging takes place in the tropical forests of the Amazon basin, Central Africa and Southeast Asia. Recent studies into the extent of illegal logging estimate that illegal logging accounts for 50–90 per cent of the volume of all forestry in key producer tropical countries and 15–30 per cent globally. Meanwhile, the economic value of global illegal logging, including processing, is estimated to be worth between US$ 30 and US$ 100 billion, or 10–30 per cent of global wood trade.The report notes a key change to the black timber market: Illegal logging, while long a widespread problem, was once driven by small-scale local loggers. But in the last five years, there’s been an explosion in more sophisticated operations. For example, a full-scale industrial logging operation might set up shop in a protected area while corrupt officials look the other way, and then use circuitous paperwork and bureaucracy to launder that timber and funnel it into the global supply.That’s exactly the situation in Laos, where cronyism is fueling a boom in illegal logging that involves corrupt corporations and the Vietnamese military. The Laos report from EIA was particularly damning in highlighting how Laos is getting little value out of its extremely valuable teak reserves due to corruption. Rather than develop a domestic logging, timber processing, and woodworking industry — something Laos’ export laws are supposed to foster — officials and corporations have sold off timber for little gain.The U.N.‘s report suggests that similar situations exist around the world, and that like we’ve seen with wildlife trafficking, organized crime has increasingly used government connections and shipping networks to open up the flow of illegal timber. And the scale is huge. For example, Indonesia officially exported 18 million more cubic meters of wood in 2008 than in 2000. While the country claimed that wood was from plantations, most of it was from natural forests.The end result, of course, is that the world’s most important (and last remaining) biodiversity and carbon sinks are disappearing with little oversight and without as much local economic gain as such destruction could produce. And, as Brian Merchant noted at Treehugger, illegal logging also circumvents a number of grants wealthier nations have given to poorer ones to help them protect their forest resources. With illegal trade fueling a boom in deforestation, it’s impossible for anyone to tell how fast what forests we have left, and all of the life they harbor, are disappearing.Follow Derek Mead on Twitter: @derektmead.
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