Yeah, I know its a bit preachy for a thread title.

But the fact remains that tropical rainforests which maintain balance in the Earth's ecosystem, are a primary defense against global warming, and preserve habitat for indigenous people and animal species, are being clear-cut at alarming rates. Most of the logging lease contracts are being obtained through graft, kickbacks, and violent coercion and with cooperation of governments like those of Malaysia and Papua New Guinea. The clear-cut land is left bare and open to tropical rains which cause massive topsoil losses and silting-in of rivers, deltas, reefs, and coastal areas. The damages are massive and irreparable. The motivation is purely one of short-term profit.

The primary culprit is a Malaysian company named Rimbunan Hijau. Timber logged from this land is generally "laundered" by shipping it to China for conversion into construction lumber and plywood, and then sent to companies for distribution and sales in Europe and Australia. YOU can help put and end to this by looking for materials only from companies boycotting the illegal lumber, which include

UK          International Plywood, Caledonian Plywood, Premier Forest Products, Wolseley UK, Screwfix(Kingfisher Group)

France       Castorama, Point P(St Gobain), PBM (Wolseley Grp), Leroy Merlin

Netherlands    Pont Meyer, Hoek Lopik, Oldenbroom

Germany         Holz Possling

Belgium          FEPCO Intl

Everyone of us needs to put pressure on our governments to not only give lip service to curtailing massive deforestation, but to abolish the importation of illegally cut timber that enables it to exist, and to lobby for a world-wide network of protected forest, and for the investigation and prosecution of companies like Rimbunan Hijau.