A new report makes the not so new or startling observation that Papua New Guinea's rainforests are being ravaged in an orgy of illegal and corrupt industrial logging carried out by criminal Malaysian timber cartels. There have been dozens of similar reports over the last nearly 20 years that have made identical observations and are now gathering dust. The problem has not been lack of awareness, but rather a lack of vision and initiative to do something about it.

Forests.org has long contended sprawling industrial logging must be shut down and PNG's entire forest sector transitioned to small scale community based ecoforestry. In my opinion the timber boom is so advanced - with the government bought and environmental community pursuing token, inadequate policies (with the possible recent exception of Greenpeace)- that Papua New Guinea's rainforests are unlikely to survive in an intact, unfragmented condition.

Barring a revolution in thinking and possibly an armed insurrection to stop the industrial criminal pillaging, this ancient rainforest wilderness will surely soon be lost. Trangu, bikpela bagarap kamap long ples na bihaintaim bilong ol pikinini. Sari tumas, stil man pinisim wok pinis, bus igo pinis, na em bai had long karim kaikai. Bai ol asples pait o dai?

Posted by Dr. Glen Barry at 8:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

A massive pipeline through the Amazon is proposed to carry natural gas from Venezuela to Brazil and Argentina. Project approval for the 9,000+ km pipeline, at a cost of over $US 20 billion, could come as early as mid-March. The pipeline would pierce the heart of the Amazon and ensure its destruction as a large, operable whole. If you have additional information, please contact us for an eventual action alert.

This questionable project is the latest industrial monstrosity to threaten the world's remaining life-giving large rainforest expanses. The world's leaders must be made to understand that all remaining large rainforests must remain intact and protected if the Earth is to be sustained. This project bears watching and must be laid to rest now, in the planning stage, rather than as construction commences.

Posted by Dr. Glen Barry at 12:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Indonesia plans to cut a 2,000 kilometer long, five kilometer wide swathe through one of the world's largest remaining areas of pristine rainforest to create a massive oil palm plantation. The project would destroy two million hectares of ancient rainforest in Kalimantan, traversing almost the entire border with Malaysia, and slicing through three national parks. These remote rainforests on the island of Borneo are home to countless species of rare birds, plants and mammals including the largest remaining wild orangutan population.

Posted by Dr. Glen Barry at 1:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (17) | TrackBacks (0)

Brazil has created two new national parks in the Amazon rainforest and expanded another, placing 1.5 million hectares (3.7 million acres) of rainforest, an area twice the size of Belgium, completely off limits to development. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's decree seeks to preserve an environmentally sensitive region in the western part of Para state long plagued by land disputes and environmental devastation, and next to where the government plans to pave a major road. Brazil's first four "Sustainable Forest Districts" or national forests for "sustainable logging" were also created.

In total some 6.4 million hectares west of the as of yet unpaved BR-163 highway were granted some form of protection. The protected areas seek to ensure that the planned paving of highway BR-163 does not result in an uncontrolled increase of logging on lands bordering the road, as has historically occurred throughout Amazonia. The controversial highway, stretching from the midwestern city of Cuiaba to the jungle port of Santarem, cuts through the heart of the rainforest and threatens to open a swath of destruction across the world's largest remaining tropical wilderness. Typically each road cut into the rainforest causes destruction for 30 miles on each side within a few years as invaders arrive to cut trees.

Forests.org has been instrumental in this victory, through years of raising awareness internationally regarding the potential impacts of road and other infrastructure development in the Amazon. Our international network has repeatedly asked the Brazilian government to increase protected areas in the Amazon, and to develop policies to mitigate deforestation. We have generated hundreds of thousands of protest emails that are a small but important part of these successful Amazon rainforest protections.

It remains to be seen whether protections of the type announced can halt follow on deforestation associated with roads in ancient forests, and just how ecologically sustainable forestry in ancient primary forests can be. Nonetheless, congratulations to Forests.org network members that participated in our years of campaigning, to the many others that work on these topics, and may Dorothy Stang who gave her life for these protections rest in peace.

Posted by Dr. Glen Barry at 11:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (14) | TrackBacks (0)

Scientists exploring an isolated rainforest in Indonesia's Papua Province, the western half of the island of New Guinea, have discovered a "lost world" with dozens of new species of frogs, butterflies and plants -- as well as large mammals hunted to near extinction elsewhere, many of which were unafraid of humans. The area located in the Foja Mountains covers more than two million acres of old growth tropical forest, and is possibly the largest pristine tropical forest in Asia. It is critical that remaining rainforest wildernesses of unmatched ecological and evolutionary splendor not be lost forever, and certainly not for logging.

Ecological Internet's action network had a role in protecting these pristine rainforests prior to their splendor even having been fully discovered, as we successfully campaigned with "Down to Earth" and others in both 1997 and 2001 to stop construction of a dam on the Mamberamo River that would have flooded the entire basin (we were aided by the Asia financial crisis). It is clear that in addition to dozens of outright victories conserving millions of hectares of ancient forests, together we have positively impacted the Earth in ways of which we are not even fully aware. If Ecological Internet did not exist, these rainforests may not either. Ecological Internet's "Earth Action Network" is the best little Earth protector in existence. Keep involved and spread the word.

Posted by Dr. Glen Barry at 2:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (12) | TrackBacks (0)