Willems Timber found guilty as forestry investigation intensifies All loggers now being probed - Minister Persaud

Willems Timber found guilty as forestry investigation intensifies
All loggers now being probed - Minister Persaud
Kaieteur News, 16 November 2007
Another timber company, Willems Timber and Trading Company Limited, has
been found guilty of breaching forestry regulations and government has
announced that it will be carrying out a 100% detailed audit
verification on all concessions, starting with the large ones.

Kaieteur News was unable to verify reports that Willems Timbers has
already been fined a reported $21 million, but the Guyana Forestry
Commission (GFC) said yesterday that it will be disclosing the results
of these investigations and the penalties to be instituted.

Yesterday, Minister of Agriculture Robert Persaud also confirmed that
he has ordered a 100% verification of records of concession holders.
Reports that two more companies were fined could not immediately be
confirmed yesterday.

The verification probe comes on the heels of an unprecedented fine
handed down recently on Barama Company Limited for $96.4 million.

Referring to the Barama situation yesterday, GFC in a press release
noted that Barama Company Limited (BCL) has paid fully the required
compensation to the GFC for “breaches of procedures committed recently
in forestry concessions leased to A Mazaharally and Sons Limited,
Barakat Timbers Limited and N. Sukul and Sons Limited.”

According to GFC, while BCL's recent press statement on the matter has
confirmed no liability on their part, the “GFC maintains its position
that the breaches were verified on the basis of substantial and
intensive investigations. The GFC also notes the willingness of BCL to
cooperate with the GFC in carrying out a comprehensive review of BCL's
procedures to avoid any recurrences.”

GFC also disclosed it was investigating another alleged breach by
Barama and “further notes the commitment expressed by BCL to cooperate
with the GFC in fully addressing another identified breach of
procedures involving both BCL and Guyana Sawmills Limited (GSM) in a
forest concession leased to GSM.”

Barama, since the fine, has also suspended five staffers for allowing
breaches in areas where permits were not yet granted.

The forestry sector has been under the spotlight for a few months now
after a senior staffer was fired and another suspended for allegedly
manipulating forestry regulations.

Since then, an investigation was launched by GFC into some aspects of
the body's operations.

Government had announced that Barama had breached regulations in a
number of cases by understating the number of logs harvested and also
incorrectly stating the origin of logs.

Last week, three GFC staffers were also fired then arrested by police
for allegedly taking bribes in an apparent ongoing investigation.

Yesterday, a logging company official claimed that the practice of
logging without permits is rampant since the process of applying for a
permit is too “bureaucratic”.

“Rather than wait, most loggers would go ahead and just log since in
most cases they are eventually granted permission.”

However, Government is serious about cleaning up the forestry sector as
is evident from the measures it has taken, ranging from fines to a
full-fledged investigation on all concession holders.

Before loggers can actually remove logs, a business plan has to be
submitted to the GFC. Included in this application to log is the area
where the logs are expected to be harvested from as well as a physical
count of the trees and number of logs that the business intends to
extract within a specific time period.

Only after a business plan is submitted will the application be
processed.

The emphasis on forest conservation and preservation has taken new
importance with Guyana expressing its willingness to preserve its
forest in light of the implications posed by climate change.

Being ranked in the top six countries of standing forests, Guyana is
hoping it can receive financial incentives for its efforts.