02.01.2014 Views

Untitled - Greenpeace

Untitled - Greenpeace

Untitled - Greenpeace

SHOW MORE
SHOW LESS

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.

78<br />

CARVING UP THE CONGO<br />

‘The UK certainly will support<br />

the maintenance of the<br />

moratorium until the [legal]<br />

review is completed and a<br />

participatory zoning plan put<br />

in place.’ 465<br />

Sharon Harvey, Africa<br />

Division, UK Department for<br />

International Development<br />

‘Donors cannot go to their<br />

parliaments, to their<br />

taxpayers, and say that we<br />

want to support nations with<br />

millions of dollars in aid when<br />

these very nations are losing,<br />

through poor forest<br />

management and<br />

governance, billions.’ 466<br />

Odin Knudsen, Senior Advisor,<br />

Sustainable Development,<br />

World Bank<br />

The DRC Government, with the assistance<br />

of the international community, must put<br />

the fight against corruption and the promotion<br />

of transparency and accountability at the heart<br />

of all government policy.<br />

This must include extending the moratorium<br />

on new forest titles until after the<br />

development of a fully participatory national<br />

land use plan based on the principle of prior<br />

informed consent which should ensure the<br />

protection of the majority of the DRC’s intact<br />

forest. Also critical is rigorous implementation<br />

of the legal review, to rule out all illegal titles.<br />

As a signatory to the Convention on Biological<br />

Diversity, the Government of the DRC must<br />

fast track the implementation of its<br />

international commitments to ‘achieve by 2010<br />

a significant reduction of the current rate of<br />

biodiversity loss at the global, regional and<br />

national level as a contribution to poverty<br />

alleviation and to the benefit of all life on earth’.<br />

The commitments include establishing a global<br />

network of forest protected areas based on<br />

‘any large, intact or relatively unfragmented or<br />

highly irreplaceable natural areas, or areas under<br />

high threat. 467 (see Appendix 1 for an<br />

overview of the relevant commitments).<br />

TIME FOR THE INTERNATIONAL<br />

DONOR COMMUNITY AND THE<br />

WORLD BANK TO ACT: THE STEPS<br />

THAT MUST BE TAKEN<br />

CRACK DOWN ON CORRUPTION AND STOP<br />

THE PLUNDER<br />

Prevent expansion of industrial logging until<br />

comprehensive social and environmental land<br />

use planning has been conducted and basic<br />

governance established<br />

What do the DRC Government and the world<br />

bank need to do?<br />

s Maintain and enforce the May 2002 logging<br />

moratorium, which prohibits the awarding of<br />

new titles and the extension and renewal of<br />

old ones.<br />

s Cancel all illegally awarded and noncompliant<br />

titles, including those in breach of<br />

the moratorium or the Forestry Code.<br />

s Impose moratorium on the expansion of<br />

existing or planned logging operations and<br />

infrastructure within intact forest landscapes<br />

and other key identified conservation areas.<br />

What does the timber trade need to do?<br />

As part of the implementation of these<br />

commitments, national strategies should be<br />

‘developed to provide interim measures to<br />

protect highly threatened or highly valued<br />

areas wherever this is necessary’.<br />

s Stop buying timber and timber products<br />

from logging companies in the DRC which<br />

are in breach of the moratorium or the<br />

Forestry Code.<br />

s Stop buying timber and timber products<br />

from logging companies operating inside<br />

intact forest landscapes and other key<br />

identified conservation areas.

Hooray! Your file is uploaded and ready to be published.

Saved successfully!

Ooh no, something went wrong!