Donations are urgently needed to fund a historic legal challenge
against Papua New Guinea's largest logging operation. Logging has
been approved in the Hunstein Range in PNG's Sepik River region.
Should the logging go ahead it will destroy 380 000 hectares of
World Heritage quality rainforest and cause unknown dislocation to
the people of this remote area.
However, since no proper negotiation with the traditional
landowners has been done, the operation is technically illegal.
The East Sepik Council of Women (ESCOW) is mounting a legal
challenge to halt the logging and support the traditional
landowners. This will be the first legal case in PNG history to
challenge a logging operation before it has begun and promises to
set a precedent for all future logging if it succeeds. ESCOW
needs to raise Kina 10 000 (US$ 10 000, AU$14 000) to fund the
challenge though and seeks your help to raise this money. Please
donate if you can or raise money through your groups.
Background
The Hunstein Range is a remote and little disturbed part of upper
East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. Circled by the April and
Salumei rivers, the Range rises above the Sepik River floodplain
to over 1500 metres altitude, and harbours a remarkable range of
biodiversity. A recent survey of one river valley in the range
found over 1200 species of plant with 10 per cent of these
estimated to be new to Western science. The area has been
recommended as a high-priority conservation area by the World
Bank's PNG Tropical Forestry Action Plan Review. It is home to
the largest stand of kauri pine (Agathis labillardieri) in the
world
Only one thousand people live in the Hunstein, village-based
subsistence farmers, sago processors and hunter/ gatherers who
live almost exclusively on forest products. While villagers wish
to retain the quality of their environment, the pressure to enter
into an agreement to allow industrial logging in the area is
increasing.
For the past year, ESCOW has been working with the people of the
Hunstein Range to develop small sustainable enterprises (such as
marketing of handicrafts, portable sawmilling, sale of forest
perfumes and cassowary farming) and to assist the Department of
Environment and Conservation in establishing a conservation area.
Logging Approved
On 26 June 1992 - the day before the new Forest Act came into
force - the National Cabinet of PNG approved the 380 000 hectare
April-Salumei logging concession covering much of the Hunstein
Range and adjoining river valleys. Forestry officers argue that
the requisite two-thirds of all landowners have signed the logging
agreement. The April-Salumei Timber Rights Purchase (TRP) was
rushed through the day before Parliament approved the new Forest
Act along with a number of other contentious logging areas. This
allows the operation to proceed under a number of provisions of
the older and less onerous Act and therefore reduces the
responsibility of resource companies to consult with landowners.
The project will now be placed out for tender and once a
contractor and environment plan have been approved, logging will
commence.
According to Port Moresby Forestry Department, their local office
in East Sepik province has very little operational funds and would
therefore be poorly placed to monitor contractual agreements on
environmental protection or landowner returns. Logging will
seriously degrade the lifestyle of the peoples of the range, will
pollute the rivers and will damage the biodiversity of the area.
The main target of the logging will be the valuable kauri stands.
Grounds for Legal Challenge
ESCOW intends to contest the declaration of the April-Salumei TRP
on one or all of the following grounds:
a. Improper process of obtaining landowner consent. It would
appear that in some cases landowners agreed to the TRP in the
face of coercion and
bribes. Earlier in the year, villagers were reportedly told that
they would be taken to court if they did not sign the logging
agreement. Forest officers visited the Range in May and June and
offered landowners 2 Kina (AUS$2.80) inducements to sign
agreements for the TRP. Most people in the area are illiterate
and had little understanding of the nature of the agreement they
were signing. In addition, it appears that by the old Act, a TRP
must have the signed consent of all landowners to proceed. The
two-thirds figure that is standard in most forestry operations is
merely a convention that has no basis in law. It continues simply
because it has not yet been
challenged.
b. Improper benefit statement in logging agreement According to
law, the TRP document must state the level of timber volume
expected from the concession and the benefits that would be
derived by the landowners. If this is not present or is
questionable, the TRP declaration may be challenged in an
administrative law action.
A lawyer has been found at reduced cost. An interim injunction
will be taken out to temporarily halt the TRP while the case is
being prepared.
This is perhaps the example in PNG of a logging operation being
challenged before it has begun on the grounds of impropoer
negotiation. Should it succeed it will signal to all other
proposed operations that full consultation and adherence to
environmental conditions must be met. It will also support the
new Wingti government in its move to establish an Inquiry into
corruption in the forest industry.
Funds Needed
Funds are needed to pay legal costs and to cover the high costs of
collecting statements from aggrieved landowners (travel to and
from the Hunstein Range is extremely expensive). K10 000 should
be adequate to bring the case to completion.
Donations should be transferred into the "East Sepik Social Action
Fund" Acct No. 049 706 8956 860 with Westpac Bank, Wewak, ESP,
PNG. Alternatively cheques may be made out to the fund and posted
to ESCOW at the address below.
Further Information
Otto Soondrawu East Sepik Council of Women PO Box 75 Wewak ESP
PNG ph +675.862 025 fax +675.862 131
Paul Chatterton AFSP 2/145 Boundary Street Clovelly NSW 2031
Australia ph+61.2.665 9713 fax +61.2.949 6435 peg: apag
peg:afsp