Emergency in Sarawak - the Penan's Last Stand (posted: 2005-7-01)

Heavily Logged North East Sarawak's remaining primary forests are under assult by logging company Samling Strategic, one of Malaysia's leading logging groups. Their activities are destroying the last primary forest habitat of the Penan tribes in the area, threaten the age-old Bario Highlands and involve illegal extraction of logs from accross the Indonesian border.p
Heavily Logged North East Sarawak's remaining primary forests are under assult by logging company Samling Strategic, one of Malaysia's leading logging groups. Their activities are destroying the last primary forest habitat of the Penan tribes in the area, threaten the age-old Bario Highlands and involve illegal extraction of logs from accross the Indonesian border.Y#

The Final Chapter for Sarawak's Primary Forests

Still the logging goes on

The international community and local indigenous and environmental groups within Malaysia have long criticized the unabated logging that has taken place in Sarawak in the last 30 years or so.  The fiercely independent Malaysian government has largely ignored this pressure, arguing its right to exploit its forest resources under its own terms in the name of economic development. Whoever is morally right is now beside the point.  Local experts estimate that more than 95% of Sarawak's original forest cover has now been logged at least once.  Less than 2% of the land area has been set aside for protection as national parks compared to 5% for Peninsula Malaysia and 10% for Indonesia.  It is likely that the few remaining portions of unprotected primary forest in Sarawak are in mountainous regions close to the border with Indonesia, and these are now being hastily logged by the five leading logging groups active in Sarawak and their myriad of subsidiaries, shell companies and associated contractors.  The State of Sarawak, its newly privatized forestry ministry alludes to sustainable harvesting of the forests on a 25 year cycle and allocation of vast tracts of land for palm and cash crop cultivation.  The net result is, as most biologists agree, destruction of the delicate 100 million year old forest ecosystem with the disappearance of the canopy.  A secondary effect now evident all over the country is an almost universal pollution of fresh water rivers and streams with silt which has severely impacted both the inland and marine fishing sectors.  Sadly, the hornbill, Sarawak's national bird and symbol of many of its tourism advertisements, is now rarely seen in a forest environment devoid of the once majestic trees 80m or more in height.  As large winged birds, the hornbill prefers to nest in the very tall trees.

The Penan's last stand

The plight of Sarawak's forest ecosystems has been symbolized by the plight of its indigenous people who rely on the forest for sustenance.  The nomadic Penan of northern Sarawak have attracted the most attention, as international campaigners like Bruno Manser highlighted the contrast between their peaceful, harmonious lifestyle and the destruction wrought by the logging industry on their traditional lands.  The plight of the remaining 200 or so nomadic Penan looks dire in terms of their ability to continue in the manner they have been accustomed to for hundreds of years.  Many of the remaining Penan are locked in a state of constant confrontation with the logging industry and the local government for preservation of their remaining forest lands.  While numerous land-rights cases are passing slowly through the legal system, the logging continues, with the local people being no match for the well funded and connected logging concession holders and their contractors.

An example of how the State of Sarawak and the logging industry are determined to free all remaining primary forest in the state for exploitation can be seen in the struggle of Penan chief Along Sega and his group.  He has been claiming an area of approximately 260 square km in the Limbang district in northeast Sarawak, near the famed Kelabit highlands.  After years of watching his forest area encroached by loggers from all sides, in mid 2004, Chief Along reluctantly agreed to accept an area of around 15 square km as his group's territory, hoping that this tiny area would be spared from logging.  Limbang Trading (a unit of Samling Strategic, one of Malaysia's largest logging firms) enacted the agreement with Along, but in early 2005, he was informed by the local branch of the Ministry of Forestry that the 15 square km would be logged and turned into tree plantations.  Clearly, Samling (the overall concession holder in the area) and the Ministry of Forestry colluded to deceive the local Penan and negotiate in bad faith. 

A new national park?

The entire area lies in a region which the Chief Minister of Sarawak has, since 2002 been considering for National Park status (the Pulong Tau National Park) due to the areas high value conservation merits (e.g. Sarawak's highest peak, Mt Murud and some of the last remaining unprotected primary forest in Sarawak which forms a continuous corridor into the remote mountainous forests of Indonesia.  Negotiations for formation of the park are painfully slow, and it is clear the leading concession holders are calling the shots.  They continue to log aggressively in the area of the proposed park and according to several NGOs, including the Environmental Investigation Agency, make forays across the border and illegal bring logs from Indonesia for processing in their camps in Sarawak.  The company who controls most of the logging concessions in the area is Samling Srategic.  This company has been the target of pressure from global conservation groups for forestry practices in Sarawak and elsewhere.  The company engages mostly in logging in tropical primary forests.  The biodiversity value of any potential Pulong Tau park is decreasing monthly as Samling seems determined to extract all economic value prior to the area being declared a park.

Devastation in Northeast Sarawak

Destined for Japan

Insiders in the logging industry in Sarawak all agree that their best customers are in Japan.  Malaysia exports 7 million cubic meters of trees to Japan each year.  The leading Japanese importers from Sarawak in 2002 were Sumitomo Forestry (400,000 m3), Itochu (220,000 m3); Nanshu Industries (170,000 m3), Marubeni (110,000 m3), NishoIwai Nichimen and Ataka. (source - Lumber Weekly, Japan). All are listed companies and sensitive to shareholder pressure and potential damage to their reputation for sourcing from Sarawak's last remaining primary forests.  Most of the produce is used to produce plywood for use in housing construction in Japan.  Samling notes that its leading Japanese customers are Sumitomo Forestry and NisshoIwai Nichimen.

Full details of trade links in tropical forestry, particularly to Japan, can be seen at www.ForestAlert.org.

Details of the plight of the Penan can be found at www.bmf.ch.

Penan Chief Along Sega, pictured with Lee Ling Timber official Kong holding an agreement not to log in Along's territory, an agreement now broken by State Forestry officials.?��??��??��In June 2005, they stated that his people had no rights to the land they have lived in for generations and the land is open to logging and clearance.

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