Newsgroups: bit.listserv.seasia-l
Date:         Thu, 8 Oct 1992 16:44:53 -0400
From:         Nhan Tran <tran@PEORA.SDC.CCUR.COM>
Subject:      CAM: Cambodia bans log exports ....

10/06

CAMBODIA BANS LOG EXPORTS IN HOPE IT WILL AVERT ECOLOGICAL DISASTER

PHNOM PENH, (OCT. 6) IPS - As Cambodia emerges from decades of war, rival
factions are chopping down trees so fast that the United Nations estimates the
country will lose most of its forests in five to 10 years.

Alarmed by this impending environmental catastrophe, Cambodia's Supreme
National Council (SNC) has imposed a ban on log exports. But experts say it
will be difficult to enforce in areas where guerrillas still roam free.

The U.N. peace plan signed in Paris last year opened up new opportunities for
timber-hungry neighbours to exploit Cambodia's largely unprotected natural
resources. All over the country, piles of freshly-cut pine, rosewood and teak
can be seen waiting to be carted off and sold abroad.

With some 250,000 hectares of forests cut last year, Cambodia has one of the
highest rates of deforestation in the world, according to the United Nations
Development Program (UNDP).

In the scramble before next year's elections, the four Cambodian factions and
logging firms have stepped up their operations. The moratorium on log exports
does not come into effect until Dec. 31.

The new log ban has drawn protests from the Khmer Rouge, which has been raking
in several hundred million dollars a year from their secret deals with Thai
loggers and their expanding exports of rubies from the Khmer Rouge-controlled
Pailin zone.

"Throughout Cambodia everyone is in a "get-rich quick" mode -- whether it is to
fuel war chests for the elections or personal enrichment prior to leaving
office," said a report prepared by UNDP environmental consultant John Dennis.

The two-billion-dollar U.N. peacekeeping operation in Cambodia has exacerbated
the environmental problem by increasing the demand for furniture, restaurants,
hotels and housing -- thus fuelling a building boom.

The UNDP report admits: "The U.N. presence itself will greatly intensify
pressures on forest resources, which are already unsustainable."

The peace pact has also handicapped the already cash-strapped government, which
has to continue paying the salaries of 200,000 doctors, teachers and civil
servants although the U.N. operation has hampered the government's
effectiveness and reduced its revenue-earning prospects.

The increasingly desperate finance minister has been counting on logging
revenues as a financial bulwark for the government's survival.

"(Since) there is no big industry (in Cambodia), everyone relies on natural
resources," a forestry official told the "Phnom Penh Post." "We'd like to ban
logging if we had some other source of revenue -- but where can we get it?"

The SNC log ban calls upon the government and the three rebel factions to
review all existing timber contracts and urges importing countries to
cooperate. Exports of sawn timber will be permitted but sawmills will be placed
under U.N. control.

The 1991 flash flood which caused some $150 million worth of damage was a
direct result of this massive deforestation in the provinces of Kompong Speu,
Takeo and Kampot.

"The flood did more damage in 24 hours than the value of all the timber that
had been extracted," said the UNDP report.

The government exported 11,300,800 cubic feet of timber in 1992 mostly to
Japan, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam. In comparison, the Khmer Rouge sold 186,300
cubic feet from their guerrilla zones, which cover only 15 percent of Cambodian
territory.

To enforce the ban, 27 military checkpoints have been set up along the Thai,
Vietnamese and Laotian borders and at two ports. But the Khmer Rouge has
thwarted attempts to establish checkpoints in its jungle bases in Pailin and
Kompong Thom, both near the Thai border.

U.N. sources admit they cannot enforce the log ban in Khmer Rouge zones without
full cooperation from the Thai military stationed along the border. Thai
officers have been the major brokers in arranging lucrative contracts between
the Khmer Rouge and logging and gem-mining companies in Thailand.

The new Thai foreign minister, Prasong Soonsiri, has pledged to end the border
trade with the Khmer Rouge. "These natural resources belong to all Cambodians
and it is our duty to help the United Nations in Cambodia," he told IPS.

But for the last 13 years, a secret unit of the Thai army has been cementing
its special ties with the Khmer Rouge, providing them sanctuary, protection and
safehouses in Bangkok.

If Thailand is to fully support the U.N. operation in Cambodia, it has to break
up this military power bloc that has been running the Cambodian border trade.

And on the Khmer side of the border, U.N. forces have to find a way to enter
the guerrilla zones if they are to enforce this first step in environmental
protection.
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