Change sought in timber policies

SOME 30 acres of African forests are destroyed daily to meet the needs of the Irish timber industry. This practice conflicts directly with Ireland's policy on development aid, the Irish Woodworkers for Africa organisation has said.

Over 70,000 tons of tropical hardwood timber are imported annually, the group claimed at a conference in Co Meath. The IWFA called on delegates from the domestic timber industry and representatives of Government and environmental organisations to adopt a forest certification scheme to protect the home industry and end the "devastation" in Africa.

In Britain, the World Wide Fund for Nature formed a buyers group committed to buying wood and wood products from independently certified forests, the conference heard.

More than 70 British companies subscribe to this, thereby controlling some £3 billion sterling worth of wood products.

"Timber certification is really taking off now, as more than four million cubic metres of certified timber enter the international trade each year," Mr Francis Sullivan, leader of the WWF's "global forests for life campaign" said.

The campaign aims to set up a network of protected areas, covering at least 10 per cent of the world's forest area by the year 2000. It also aims to secure the independent certification of at least 10 million hectares of well managed forest by 1998.

"The Irish industry now has the chance to make its mark by creating an Irish buyers' group," Mr Sullivan added.

Mr Tom Roche of the IWFA said the Government invested development aid in Africa, but this was undermined by Irish timber importation practices. The IWFA wants the Government to direct its development aid at specific African countries, to encourage sustainable forest management and the use of certification.