[CTC] PM won't sacrifice marketing boards to get to Pacific trade talks

[Arthur Stamoulis]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/10/peru-forestry-trade-idUSL2E8FACNT20120410

Peru exports endangered wood despite US trade pact -NGO


LIMA, April 10 | Tue Apr 10, 2012 3:44pm EDT
(Reuters) - Peru needs to do more to halt exports of endangered cedar  
and mahogany from the Amazon rain forest as it opens its economy to  
free trade, a conservation group and exporters said on Tuesday.
The U.S.-Peru free trade agreement passed by Congress in 2007 includes  
provisions meant to prevent the export of endangered wood species to  
the United States, but those efforts have been tainted by corruption  
in rural areas, they said.

Peru is one of Latin America's fastest-growing economies, and its  
exports will likely increase in coming years as its trade agreements  
with major economies like the European Union and Japan go into force.  
It also has a vast informal sector dedicated to mining and other  
resource extraction.

The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES),  
which Peru is required to honor under its free trade commitments to  
the United States, requires exporters to present certifications of  
origin for cedar and mahogany wood.

The certifications are supposed to guarantee the precise location of  
logging and ensure sustainable forestry practices, but the  
Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), and NGO, says it found  
irregularities in 35 percent of the certified wood Peru exported to  
the United States from May 2008 to May 2010.

"The state says that Peru doesn't export illegal wood because all the  
wood leaves with legal documents," said Julia Urranaga, an adviser for  
EIA. "The problem is that these papers don't have the capacity to  
guarantee the wood's origin."

EIA says authorities that grant forestry concessions in Peru's rain  
forest frequently issue documents that trace the wood's origin to  
trees that do not actually exist, meaning the certified wood really  
comes from protected nature reserves or lands reserved for uncontacted  
indigenous tribes.

The practice is eliminating trees that help ward off climate change  
and taking advantage of poor, vulnerable populations that are forced  
to work in unsafe environments, the group says.

"Illegal logging is the fruit of a criminal structure, a wood mafia,"  
said Francesco Mantuano, general manager of export company Amazon  
Exports (OPEX).

He says it is hard to find responsibly harvested wood.

Peru passed a forestry law in July of last year to help formalize  
logging and put it in compliance with the U.S. Free trade agreement,  
but the law has not yet been implemented.

Peru will also receive some $150 million in forestry conservation  
funding from international organizations in coming years, when its new  
trade agreements also go into effect. (Reporting By Caroline Stauffer.  
Additional reporting by Doug Palmer in Washington. editing by Gunna  
Dickson)

Arthur Stamoulis
Citizens Trade Campaign
(202) 494-8826




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