Illegal timber trade: a business worth 100 billion a year
Environment — di Rudi Bressa
A river of money flowing into the pockets of organised crime, fuelling deforestation and corruption. In Italy, one fifth is of illicit origin.
Illegal timber trade: a business worth 100 billion a year
A river of money flowing into the pockets of organised crime, fuelling deforestation and corruption. In Italy, one fifth is of illicit origin.
It is the dark side of the timber and pulp product trade. A business worth between 30 and 100 billion euros every year, which ends up financing organised crime. A traffic second only to the drug trade.
Deforestation, arson, illicit timber management: the figures surrounding eco-crimes linked to the forestry sector are staggering, the world over. "Illegal activities in the forest-timber sector account for approximately 30 per cent of total forest felling, contributing between 50 per cent and 90 per cent to deforestation in some tropical areas, such as central Africa, the Amazon and South-East Asia," reads the chapter dedicated to the world of timber in Legambiente's Ecomafia 2016 report, edited by Antonio Brunori and Eleonora Mariano of Pefc Italia. The phenomenon is rampant in Europe too: one fifth of imports of forest-origin products come from illicit sources.
According to the Unep report produced in collaboration with Interpol, it is estimated that between 62 and 86 per cent of all illegal tropical timber entering the EU and the United States arrives in the form of paper, pulp or wood chips.
Italy, fires on the rise
In our country, in 2015 alone, dozens of fires were recorded, burning more than 37,000 hectares of woodland. That is 49 per cent more than the previous year. Of these, 57 per cent broke out within regions historically subject to mafia infiltration. A deep-rootedness in the territory that allows access to European funds and thus control over entire areas.
Illicit timber, one fifth of the total
Against this backdrop, Italy, the world's fourth-largest timber importer (with over 10 billion euros, it is the top market for the import of logs and other wood products from countries globally recognised for high levels of illegality in the sector: Bosnia, Albania, Serbia, Romania, Cameroon and Côte d'Ivoire.
"In this respect, the official estimates calculating a range of between 10 and 20 per cent of timber entering our country after having been felled or traded illicitly, with a turnover of around two billion euros, are entirely realistic, and perhaps even an underestimate," the two authors of the dedicated chapter stated. It is no coincidence that in 2014 alone, the sector in Italy saw 41,000 inspections carried out, with 5,000 administrative sanctions imposed, 500 people reported and 12 arrests or detentions by the Corpo Forestale dello Stato.