08/25 MALAYSIA TO SPEED UP LARGE-SCALE REAFFORESTATION KUALA
LUMPUR, Aug 25, Reuter - Malaysia, accused by Western green groups
of overlogging, will reduce logging and speed up reafforestation,
Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Ghafar Baba said on Tuesday.
"We may even deploy the army to check on illegal
logging," he told reporters after chairing a meeting of the
forestry council. "We have to act fast to safeguard national
wealth."
The government will also allow private firms to
undertake reafforestation, which will cover a total area of
over 860,000 hectares (2.1 million acres), he said.
Timber concessions to loggers may also be scrapped to
check illegal logging and stiffer penalties, including
caning, may be imposed on illegal loggers.
Malaysia, a major tropical hardwood exporter, earned 9.4
billion ringgit ($3.7 billion) in 1991 from wood exports, up
from 8.9 billion ($3.5 billion) in 1990. Timber is
Malaysia's second largest commodity export earner after
petroleum.
Malaysia produces about 10 million cubic metres (350
million cubic feet) of timber annually and cuts an area of
52,000 hectares (128,000 acres), according to government
figures.
Some 74 per cent of Malaysia's land area is forested, 61
per cent of it natural forests and 13 per cent planted
areas, including oil palm and rubber trees.
Malaysia has been criticised by Western
environmentalists for allowing its rainforests to be cut
down, especially in the Borneo state of Sabah and Sarawak,
and threatening the livelihood of tribespeople who live
there.
Abdul Ghafar maintained that logging was carried out on
a sustainable basis.
"These Western activists have even said that we are
denying rights to the Penans in Sarawak," he said. "But when
serious human rights abuse occurs in Bosnia, we don't hear
these activists championing the races which are being
oppressed there."
Abdul Ghafar said Malaysia was keen to adopt privatised
reafforestation programmes similar to those in South
America.
"We want to emulate the South American experience," he
said. He said Malaysia would allow companies 60-year leases
to the land which would be planted with fast-growing species
of high-quality wood.
[Entered Greenbase August 25, 1992 ]
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