A moratorium on new Forest Clearance Authorities, recently
announced by the PNG Forest Authority, has been welcomed by
community advocacy organization ACT NOW, but the group says the
measure does not go far enough.
ACT NOW is pleased the National Forest Board has recognized
that the FCA system is being widely abused and has ordered a halt
on the issuing of new Authorities and an audit of all existing FCA
projects.
FCAs are supposed to be used to allow the clearance of small
discrete areas of forest so they can be planted with agricultural
crops or for a road to be built, but instead, the PNG Forest
Authority has been issuing FCA permits that cover tens of thousands
of hectares of forest and which are used by logging companies for
large-scale export logging operations.
This is evidenced, says ACT NOW by the fact that 25% of total
log exports in 2021 were sourced from FCA permit areas.
But there are also widespread abuses associated with other
logging permit types, particularly the Timber Right Purchase, that
also demand a moratorium and review.
In September 2022, ACT NOW issued a public call on the new
Forest Minister to urgently address rampant illegal and
unsustainable logging by issuing a moratorium on both new FCA
projects and on the extension or renewal of any permits issued
under Timber Rights Purchase Agreements. ACT NOW also called for an
independent review of all existing logging projects to assess their
legality and impacts.
As well as calling for the extension of the moratorium to cover
all new timber permits and licences, ACT NOW says that it is
important that any audit of existing FCAs is conducted
independently and transparently and with full community
participation.
It is the PNGFA that has developed and approved the existing FCA
permits that are characterized by widespread procedural abuse and
lack of community consent. It will clearly be nonsense for the
same forestry officers to now audit the permits they issued to
assess their
legality.
ACT NOW says the PNGFA must publish the terms of reference for
the project audit and should seek donor assistance to engage
credible independent experts to conduct the reviews.
ACT NOW is also concerned that a National Court Order issued in
June 2021 calling for a halt to all logging in TRP areas has been
ignored by the Forest Authority and that logging is continuing
unabated in those areas. According to research conducted by ACT NOW
the TRP areas covered by the court order are still producing over
40% of PNGs total log exports.
ACT NOW says while the moratorium on new...