Papua New Guinea - Fern

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shelter and other basic needs from the forests. The continued focus of government and donors on policing industrial forestry in order to limit its environmental impact fails to acknowledge other forest values – including both current subsistence uses and foregone opportunities to pursue ecologically based and sustainable community development. Threatened Species New environmental legislation has recently been enacted, but has not fully entered into force due to delays in writing regulations to implement the legislation. Given the millions of dollars invested in increasing capacity at the Department of Environment and Conservation, they remain amazingly without capacity. Over the last few years there has been little operational funds meaning little or no monitoring or fieldwork has been occurring. So, while there is legislation in place, it is not being implemented. This is not deemed a priority by the government. So little is known regarding patterns of biodiversity in PNG that only very few species benefit from such legislation. Even when protection is given, as with the Queen Alexandria Birdwing butterfly – the largest butterfly in the World, and is critically endangered – projects such as the World Bank’s Oro Oil Palm project are still allowed to destroy critical habitat – against PNG law and Bank policy. Threatened species are given no real protection in PNG. Incentives The recently approved GEF “Mama Graun” trust fund, part of the World Bank’s new Forestry and Conservation project, shows potential to provide the much needed funding source for those that wish to pursue biodiversity friendly development options. The problem is that there is still no legislation, or rules and regulations in place to ensure that such projects have legal standing and are not continually encroached upon. Many good alternative forest uses succumb to pressures to pursue commercial logging because there is no system of legal conservation status and enforcement. Environmental and Strategic Impact Assessments The new environmental legislation provides a well developed methodology that is beyond PNG’s capacity and is not adequately funded. Logging, mining, oil palm and other highly destructive development activities continue to occur with cursory or non-existent environmental assessments. When they do occur, they are viewed as a formality – not as a real review that may stop the biologically damaging project. Country Monitor Comments, Conclusion and Recommendations In the decade since ratification of the CBD by Papua New Guinea, not even rudimentary first steps have been taken to implement the convention. Meanwhile, a voracious timber industry threatens essentially all forest biodiversity in PNG and the continued existence of contiguous, intact, unfragmented habitats in which they are maintained. Low levels of governmental commitment to biodiversity conservation, and the World Bank’s failure to honor in a timely fashion their obligations to serve as the implementing agency, border on negligence and show bad faith. This report will now highlight several aspects of current biodiversity policy that are most troubling, and threaten to eliminate huge areas of biodiversity rich forest habitats before CBD processes such as a National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan are developed and implemented. 10
Logging Boom Threatens Biodiversity and Ecosystems There has been a complete breakdown in forest sector management in Papua New Guinea. One of the World’s last great rainforests – an ancient store of evolutionary brilliance displayed through its biodiversity – is being razed to the ground. For one and a half decades, reform of this industry has failed miserably. Papua New Guineans receive only a pittance for these log exports – while bearing significant immediate environmental costs and forgone development options. In essence, Papua New Guineans are paying for their forests to be logged. In the late 1980s, the Barnett Inquiry, which exhaustively investigated the PNG timber industry, reported "It would be fair to say, of some of the companies, that they are now roaming the countryside with the self-assurance of robber barons; bribing politicians and leaders, creating social disharmony and ignoring laws in order to gain access to, rip out, and export the last remnants of the province's valuable timber." The Prime Minister of PNG recently admitted "Governance has been particularly poor in the area of forestry, with the side effect of promoting corrupt practices and undermining environmental sustainability in logging activities". Recent reports indicate the following problems continue to systematically plague the industry: • Still virtually no sustainable forestry projects • Widespread environmental damage • Logging projects provide few long-term benefits, causing social upheaval • Corruption a persistent problem at all levels of the industry • Minimal domestic processing investment • Alternatives to industrial log exports such as eco-forestry projects are not supported • Continued violations of human rights After countless broken promises to pursue reform by the government, and millions of dollars of failed donor aid programs, including massive subsidies to reform commercial logging, nothing has changed – in fact, it has gotten worse. The emphasis for biodiversity conservation continues to be upon reforming the poorly performing logging industry – trying to establish monitoring and policing that would end the worst of the abuses. But after 15 years of efforts this has still not been successful. There has been no questioning of the dominant paradigm that commercial scale forestry in these tropical rainforests may be inimical to biodiversity conservation, and will never achieve acceptable levels of ecological sustainability, biodiversity conservation and community development. Local initiatives by forest peoples to protect and benignly manage their forests are actively impeded. Papua New Guinea's magnificent ancient forests and biodiversity are at a crossroads. They can continue to be ravaged by industrial logging, or they can flourish and be sustained, providing long-term livelihoods for communities that manage them while maintaining biodiversity and operable ecosystems. Given well-documented concerns regarding the environmental and social costs of the current timber industry, it is difficult to justify continued exploitive and nonsustainable log exports. PNG has a real opportunity to change the way that forest are managed to ensure greater benefits for PNG, conserve biodiversity and achieve long term sustainability. But first it needs a well-conceived National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan that addresses, head on, the threat posed by commercial logging – while detailing a new forest management paradigm based upon community eco-forestry management and protected areas. 11
Page 1 and 2: Status of Implementation of Forest-
Page 3 and 4: This report is part of a series of
Page 5 and 6: elieved only a small proportion of
Page 7 and 8: Questionnaire Results Reporting The
Page 9: maintain, accelerate and subsidize
Page 13 and 14: During the course of the moratorium
Page 15 and 16: ecommends that government revise th

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