British green campaigners direct their wrath on Scandinavian timber suppliers who are ravaging the last of the region's verdant tracts
IN A bid to save the last vestiges of
Scandinavia's ancient forests, some of
Britain's largest paper and timber consumers agreed in December last to exert
pressure on Scandinavian timber suppliers. Environmental activists reached a
consensus with several companies,
including Sainsbury's and the BBC
Magazines chain, on adoption of methods to avoid buying timber obtained
from these forests. These forests bar-hour some of the oldest trees in the
world and are habitats of rare insect and
fungus species.
The British companies have asked
their Scandinavian suppliers for exact
information about the regions their
supply comes from, so that they can
check against a list of old-growth areas
provided by environmentalists in each
of the three Nordic countries. "if we
find that any of our supplies are coming
from somewhere mentioned on the list,
we will stop buying it," says George
White from Sainsmary's.
Environmentalists have long been
concerned about largescale logging in
Scandivanian forests, which were widely
seen as one of the 'greenest' forest tracts
in the world. They are also one of the
most ecologically rich forests.
These forests shelter a wide variety
of tree species of all ages (from ancient
to new species) and house a large proportion of dead and decaying timber.
Besides, the forests are home to a great
variety of insects and fungi, some of
which are on the endangered species list.
For example, in Norway itself, nearly
898 forest species, about hall of the
country's total, have been placed on the
endangered species list due to loss of
habitat.
The Taiga Rescue Network - an
umbrella group of green organisations
of Scandinavia - is coordinating the
campaign to persuade companies to
boycott timber from these old-growth
areas, with assistance from the UK-based
Women's Environmental Network and
Reforest the Earth. The UK And western 75 per cent of
Europe import more than
Scandinavian timber. The campaigners
have alleged that throughout Scavdinavian, there remains only between two
to five per cent of old-growth forests.
They have brought to notice some key
old-growth areas where recently rampant logging has been carried out. Some
of these places are Kuusamo in Kainuu
near the Finland-Russia border, where
some of the trees are more than 600
years old; and Valtimo in Finnish
Karelia, one of the last homegrounds of
the rare flying squirrel.
Scandinavia is also exporting timber
after importing them from old-growth
forests in Russia. Major Finnish paper
companies have imported timber from
all these forests. As a detection measure,
members of the Finnish Nature League
stencilled the phrase 'old growth timber'
on the ends of newly cut logs in
Kurisamo. But after six months, the
foresters sliced off the marked ends and
took away the logs, said Kaisa Raitio, a
league member.
Environmentalists, ironically, are
not in favour of boycotting Scandinavian timber. They simply want the
companies to certify that the timber is
coming from sustainably managed
forests- Campaigners of Reforest the
Earth have decided to wait and watch
for six months, and if even then the
situation does not improve, they
are determined to hurl their missiles
at British paper and timber buyers
and retailers.
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