Papua
New Guinea — The Paradise Forests weblog features
contributions from international volunteers at
the Global Forest Rescue Station in Lake Murray,
a remote area in the Western Province of Papua
New Guinea. Our campaigners and activists on board
our flagship, the Rainbow Warrior, also sent through
blogs, as they sailed around the region on 'Forest
Crime Patrol'.
In Beijing, we set up a China
Forest Rescue Station, as most of the illegally
logged timber from the Paradise Forests is sent
to China for processing into cheap wood products,
then exported or sold to the growing domestic
market.
PNG landowner Brian Barring
contributed blogs as he travelled through Europe
and the UK, spreading the word about the situation
in his homeland. The UK and EU countries are also
big consumers of illegally logged timber products.
The weblog brings the fight
to save the Paradise Forests to life. It draws
us in to the Lake Murray community. We share the
commitment of the volunteers and the joy of the
landowners as their shared dream – to establish
sustainable, small-scale, eco-forestry projects
– became a reality.
Lukautim Bus
‘Lukautim Bus’ was the Pidgin
slogan for our campaign. It means ‘Protect Our
Forest’ or, using a more literal translation,
‘Look After Our Bush’. The slogan was unveiled
on the Rainbow Warrior, as it arrived in Port
Moresby to a traditional welcome. The campaign
had officially kicked off!
At the GFRS, our first lucky
volunteers were trying to get the hang of their
new way of life. Europeans Flo and Klaas were
determined to mast the art of canoeing, hunting
and fishing, so they could become part of the
group - "boy bilong grup" in Pidgin.
Flo and Klaas became so adept
at their new hunter-gatherer lifestyle, they even
took on the task of providing food for the camp
themselves – or so they say!
Setting sail
After holding open day for the
public, the Warrior farewells their new Port Moresby
friends and sets off. The next stop is Jayupura,
in Papua, where the ship receives another colourful
welcome. The local campaigners hold an eco-forestry
forum and many influential people attend, including
the Governor of Jayapura, the Provincial Forest
Minister, spokespeople from NGOs and leaders of
more than 15 Papuan tribes.
In Manokwari, the campaigners
and crew held a similar forum at the local university,
which actually had it’s own forest out the back!
After so long at sea, it was a welcome sight.
Stop trashing my forest!
Meanwhile, Brian saw snow for
the first time in his life. Battling the cold
weather – and adjusting to a European diet of
bread, bread and more bread – Brian took his message
to the media, civil servants and politicians as
he made his way around Europe. In the UK he delivered
an impassioned plea to Alchemy Partners, whose
company, Montague L Meyer, sells plywood made
from Bintangor and other tropical species. Brian’s
message was simple and direct: “Stop trashing
my forest!”
A taste of Paradise
Like Brian, the volunteers at
the GFRS were coming to terms with being far,
far from home. Life at ‘Camp Kewe’ gave them a
new appreciation of just how much the forest means
to the people of Lake Murray. It really is their
‘supermarket’. They go there to find everything
they need – not just food, but all the materials
they need for shelter and transport (dug-out canoes)
too.
The new lifestyle bought with
it certain dilemmas. Flo and Klaas encountered
a dangerous snake (a death adder) which they implored
the local boys not to kill. Their regret is relayed
through the blog; while writing it, they reached
a new understanding of the realities of forest
life. They, after all, had never lost a friend
or relative to a snake bite.
In a similar vein, Merel’s conscious
effort to avoid any offensive that turning down
a local delicacy (turtle soup) would cause, led
her to a chance meeting with some local women
– one of whom needed a lift to the local hospital
with her newborn baby. Of course, the GFRS team
were happy to oblige.
Speaking of soup, the Warrior,
en route to Jakarta, came across shark fisherman
whose plight reminded Hapsoro that poor communities
aren’t just ripped off for their forest products.
These fishermen worked hard to catch sharks in
open water. Their spoils are sold at well below
the market rate, because the demand for cheap
marine products drives prices down.
Getting down to business
The volunteers at the GFRS were
there to work, and work they did. Together with
the landowners and foresters from the Foundation
for People and Community Development (FPCD), they
set about marking the boundaries of the land owned
by the various clans at Lake Murray.
While small teams of volunteers
were off boundary marking, others joined landowners
for training days in eco-forestry. The training
includes field trips, allowing the landowners
and volunteers to put their new skills into action.
As word spread around the lake,
more and more clans wanted to join the eco-forestry
project. In order for the clans to set up their
eco-forestry business, they had to map out their
land, and designate a use (hunting, sago plantations,
eco-forestry, etc) for different areas. A local
NGO (non-government organisation) called Barefoot
held workshops to help with the mapping out process,
using sticks, string and different types of leaves
to represent the various areas.
Barefoot also encouraged debate
about sustainable community development, and initiated
discussions on how each clan could use the proceeds
from eco-forestry to benefit their village.
Cause for celebration
People from all over the lake
came to see the arrival of the sawmill. This portable
piece of equipment, used to mill trees into timber
on-the-spot, thus causing minimal damage to the
forest, was welcomed to the region with a traditional
‘sing sing’. FPCD will lease sawmills to landowners
on a buy-back scheme as their eco-forestry business
takes shape.
Meanwhile, Lake Murray received
its first order – a handwritten note requesting
43 pieces of eco-timber (around 2 metre cubed).
Sep, the leader of the Kuni tribe, which invited
Greenpeace and our partners to Lake Murray, arranged
for a sunken barge to be refloated, to transport
the eco-timber out. Everything was falling into
place …
Bearing witness to forest
crime
Out at sea, the crew of the
Warrior were confronted with the realities of
illegal logging, when it encountered the MV Ardhianto,
a huge cargo ship loaded with a slice of the Paradise
Forests. It was being loaded up with timber from
the Kayu Lapis Indonesia mill – known to trade
in destructively and illegally logged timber.
Our activists, including Hapsoro,
a campaigner from Indonesia, hung two big “Stop
Ancient Forest Destruction” banners, as they watched
from inflatables, bearing witness to the forest
crime.
Hapsoro was present again a
month later, when the Ardhianto arrived in Yokohama,
Japan, to unload its devastating cargo. This time,
activists unfurled banners that asked, “Is this
timber legal?”
Technology and tradition
meet
Out in the forest, the boundary
marking was coming along in leaps and bounds,
thanks to the foresters and their GPS. FPCD had
only recently started using the Global Positioning
Systems. In the past, they used a long tape measure!
At Campe Kewe, 18-year-old Susan,
of the Yongom tribe, sat down with Merel, one
of the GFRS volunteers, and wrote a weblog. It
was the first time Susan had ever used a computer.
Amele, a forester from FPCD,
also contributed a blog, about gender equality
on the lake.
Behold, eco-forestry!
The felling of the first tree
was a “sombre and dramatic” landmark in the project.
A few days later, when the first shipment of eco-timber
was loaded onto the barge, Lake Murray was buzzing.
Years of planning went into
the eco-forestry project. In 2006, after three
months of lessons, practice sessions and planning
meetings, the people of Lake Murray – and their
posse of international friends – could finally
say, “Em Nao: Eco-Timber!” (“Behold: Eco-Timber!”).
