Wagons brimming with logs accumulate in the Siberian railway station of Dalnerechensk, more than 8,000km (4,971 miles) east of Moscow. They are waiting to cross the nearby Chinese border.
Once in China, they will be processed and used for construction or turned into garden furniture and other products to be sold in European and US shops.
More than a third of all Russian logs are smuggled by mafias, a practice that doubled between 2005 and 2007, according to official figures... [Continue]
The government of Madagascar has been accused by conservation groups of allowing the illegal trade in precious wood to flourish.
Environmental campaigners claim that an executive decree issued last month legalising the export of raw hardwood, including rosewood and ebony, has given free rein to criminal gangs who fell endangered trees to sell on the international market... [Continue]
The Minister of Forestry and Wildlife, Elvis Ngolle Ngolle has dismissed as false reports by a French Non Governmental Organisation, Les Amis de la Terre , that Cameroon's forest is logged with little or no respect of the law. He was talking within the framework of government communication. The forestry and wildlife boss hinged his presentation on four main axes: report of the French NGO, fight against illegal logging, issuing of licences, and complexity of forest operation... [Continue]
Freetown, Sierra Leone - Sierra Leone on Thursday announced strict new rules to curb logging misuses, a day after lifting a six-month ban on the export of timber to stop alleged widespread plundering of its natural forests.
"With immediate effect, forest rangers will have to supervise the cutting of trees for logs and no tree should be cut without their supervision," Forestry Minister Sam Sessay said... [Continue]
Cameroon - Illegal forest exploitation has become an issue of great concern to environment and forestry officials in the East Province.
Statistics from the East Provincial Delegation of Forestry and Wildlife indicate that 1665 cubic meters of white wood were seized from loggers in the Dengdeng and Goyoum forest reserves between November 2007 and April 2008... [Continue]
Vietnam - A group of illegal loggers assaulted two forest officials in central Quang Ngai Provinces Son Ha District as they were recording the seizure of a load of wood from the loggers Tuesday.
Dinh Van Chi, deputy chairman of Son Giang Commune, and Dinh Van Anh, an official from the Thach Nham Forest Board, were the victims of the attack... [Continue]
