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British consumers of merbau hardwood flooring are being misled by High Street retailers, DIY stores and leading brands into buying illegal timber stolen from the forests of Indonesia’s remote Papua Province, revealed the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and their Indonesian partner, Telapak, in a new report today.

Illegal merbau logs in Papua, Indonesia, awaiting collection, February 2003. Copyright Dave Currey/Environmental Investigation Agency

British Consumers Duped into Buying Timber Stolen from Papua’s Precious Rainforests

British consumers of merbau hardwood flooring are being misled by High Street retailers, DIY stores and leading brands into buying illegal timber stolen from the forests of Indonesia’s remote Papua Province, revealed the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and their Indonesian partner, Telapak, today.

A new EIA/Telepak report, entitled ‘Behind the Veneer’, lifts the veil on the flooring industry and shows how leading retailers, including Travis Perkins, Jewson and John Lewis, and the flooring brands they market, like Junckers and Armstrong/Bruce, are making false environmental claims while selling flooring made from merbau which they cannot even prove comes from legal sources.

EIA/Telapak gathered environmental policy information from manufacturers and retailers and conducted undercover investigations into their suppliers. They discovered that while manufacturers and retailers typically claim to buy timber only from carefully managed forests, their suppliers openly admitted to using merbau from unknown sources in Papua, where powerful smuggling syndicates drive massive illegal logging. None could prove their merbau was legal.

Julian Newman, Head of Forest Campaign at EIA, said: “Although suppliers and retailers of merbau flooring are not themselves breaking the law, they are profiting from an illegal trade and are misleading their customers into buying products made from stolen timber.”

“These companies need to stop duping their customers and must take urgent steps to ensure the legal origin of their wood.”

Illegal logging is rife in Papua, an area recently dubbed ‘the Garden of Eden’ by international scientists. In January 2005 alone, enough merbau was stolen from Papua to produce flooring in excess of £342 million at western retail pricess. Despite recent enforcement efforts, illegal merbau is still leaking into the market through international smuggling syndicates. These syndicates collude with the Indonesian military and police to exploit and intimidate local communities into accepting less than £10 for a cubic metre of merbau – timber worth nearly £2,000 when sold as flooring in the UK market.

Arbi Valentinus, Head of Forest Campaign at Telapak, said, “The British people would be appalled if they knew that the wood used to make their flooring had been stolen from the poor, indigenous communities of Indonesia’s Papua Province.”

“Ultimately, the government should safeguard consumers by preventing retailers from selling products made from stolen timber. However, despite repeated promises to act, no law has been enacted, putting the responsibility on consumers to take action and stop buying merbau products that fuel illegal logging.”

To assist consumers, EIA/Telapak have produced a guide on how to avoid illegal timber. The guide highlights the issues behind illegal logging, explains common strategies manufacturers use to mislead consumers, and provides advice on how to guarantee that the timber the UK public buys is legal.

• Over 70 per cent of Indonesia’s original frontier forests have already been lost, and each year an area the size of Belgium is destroyed. Eighty per cent of logging in Indonesia is illegal.

• Recent studies indicate that the EU imported at least €3 billion of illegal timber and wood products in 2004, with Indonesia the largest source (€0.9 billion).

• The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) is the world’s leading organisation dedicated to investigating and exposing environmental crime.

• Telapak is an independent, environmental non-profit group based in Bogor, Indonesia. More information at www.telapak.org

FILE DOWNLOADS

Consumer Guide PDF File [96.53 K]   DOWNLOAD

Questions Answered Word Document [144.50 K]   DOWNLOAD

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