World Bank failing to stop Congo rainforest destruction – Greenpeace

London, 19 April: The World Bank is failing to stop Western logging firms from devastating the tropical rainforests of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to a report by Greenpeace.

Carving up the Congo claims that the World Bank has so far fallen short of its aims of bringing the logging industry under control and ensuring local communities benefit from valuable logging contracts, by making firms pay taxes.

Filip Verbelen, Africa forest campaigner at Greenpeace International, said: "If the World Bank is serious about tackling climate change, it must act to contain the logging industry in the DRC and initiate large-scale protection of the country's rainforests."

In 2002, the World Bank claimed a victory against illegal logging, persuading the government of the DRC to suspend allocating new contracts and refuse to renew existing contracts. A World Bank tax review uncovered 163 'non-compliant' contracts covering 25.5 million hectares of rainforest, and the contracts were cancelled. Many of the areas set aside under these non-compliant contracts were not being logged, according to Greenpeace.

But despite the moratorium, Greenpeace claims that the DRC government has since signed 107 new contracts, covering 15 million hectares of rainforest.

The World Bank is now conducting a legal review of 156 logging contracts, but the report says: "Greenpeace fears that the legal review could become an exercise in laundering illegal contracts."

It adds: "Foreign companies… have had new contracts signed after the May 2002 moratorium. The majority have therefore benefited from the World Bank's failure to ensure that the moratorium it negotiated… [has] been enforced."

Greenpeace presents evidence that logging firms have apparently taken over areas covered by those non-compliant titles, many of which are in "intact forest landscapes", particularly important for storing carbon dioxide. In addition, all of the areas set aside for logging are inhabited by "forest-dependent communities", including pygmy hunter-gatherers and 20 of the contracts are in critical bonobo habitats.

"The cancellation of non-compliant titles in April 2002 did little more than take logging rights away from speculative owners who did not use them, freeing up space for new logging operations," the report concludes.

But Danzer Group, one of the firms listed in the report, denies signing contracts since the moratorium. Olof von Gagern, chief executive officer for lumber in Europe and Africa at Danzer Group, said: "Our company Siforco did not acquire any new concessions during the moratorium. To the contrary, we gave parts of our concessions back to the government."

In addition, the report accuses firms of bartering with local communities to get permission to log in their area. Companies are accused of swapping valuable logging rights for gift packages such as a few bars of soap, coffee, beer and a couple of bags of sugar and salt. Other promised improvements for local communities, such as schools, have failed to materialise, Greenpeace claims.

The World Bank did not return requests for comment before press time.