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Extracted from
Malaysiakini
Groups ditch forestry consultation process
Fauwaz
Abdul Aziz | Mar 19,
A multi-stakeholder consultation on ways to prevent the import of
illegal timber into
Yesterday, the coalitions - JOANGOHutan and Joas - comprising representatives
of indigenous peoples and environmental groups alleged that their presence was
aimed only at endorsing a flawed process rather than being allowed to improve
it through input.
The plantation industries and commodities ministry has spearheaded
consultations with interest-groups since June 22 last year.
The aim is to incorporate their views into the Voluntary
Partnership Agreement (VPA) on timber imports which the government hopes to
conclude with the European Commission (EC).
The VPA comes under the EC’s Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade
(FLEGT) action plan, a larger European Union (EU) initiative to stop imports of
illegally-sourced timber.
It is said that more than 50 percent of all tropical timber and more than 20
percent of boreal timber coming into the EU is illegally-sourced.
However, one activist said the government agencies have not included all the
proposals of the lobby groups in the Timber Legality Assurance System (TLAS),
on which the issuance of licences will be based.
“They told us that our proposals would be taken into
consideration,” said Sarawak Dayak Iban Association secretary-general
“But all this while, most of our concerns and proposals have not been written
into the documents at all.”
One of the most significant proposals concern the definition of ‘legal timber’.
The current VPA defines ‘legal timber’ as that ‘harvested by licensed person
from approved areas and timber and timber products exported in accordance with
the laws, regulations and procedures pertaining to forestry, timber industry
and trade of Malaysia’.
Many groups have pointed out, however, that such a definition
ignores the incidence of smuggled timber that has been certified as legal in
It also ignores the fact that logging licences have often been issued on land
claimed by indigenous communities without their free, prior and informed
consent.
JOANGOHutan and Joas had proposed that Malaysian legal timber be defined as
that originating from within
This definition was not incorporated into the draft TLAS, said Mujah.
‘Meet
minimum demand’
Centre for Orang Asli Concerns coordinator
According to the Act, no licence for the collection of forest produce shall be
issued to anyone who is ‘not being aborigines normally resident in that
aboriginal area’ without consulting the director-general of the Department of
Orang Asli Affairs.
The Act also provides that ‘in granting any such licence it may be ordered that
a specified proportion of aboriginal labour be employed’.
The government rejected this, however, and contended that the National Forestry
Act 1984 - which does not provide for such extensive protection of Orang Asli
interests - is “sufficient”.
Commenting on this, Peninsular Malaysia Orang Asli Association
information chief Norya Abas said it was ridiculous to use the Forestry Act to
protect human communities.
“The Act is to protect the forest. It doesn’t protect the Orang Asli
communities that live in them, as does the Orang Asli Act,” he said.
In a joint statement issued yesterday to the chairperson of the consultative
process, the coalitions said the issue of defining what constitutes legal
timber is only one of their ‘minimum’ demands.
“... A definition which merely requires parties to abide by the law as set out
in statutory provisions is simplistic and fails to deal with the real issue,”
they said.
The real issue pertains to “respect for the Orang Asal as a
people, as an autonomous community with our own customs, laws and institutions
and the need to ensure that governmental actions do not jeopardise the very
survival of our community but provide for the socio economic upliftment of the
same”.
“In view of this unacceptable censuring, we are left with no choice but to
officially withdraw from this process until our minimum demand is met. We
refuse to continue to participate in a process that is making decisions over
our lives and yet expects our participation to be mere endorsement of a process
that does not respect us.”
The coalitions had planned to meet ministry officials over the matter today,
but the appointment was called off by the ministry. Its spokesperson declined
to give reasons, when contacted.