MULTIPLE IMPACTS OF ILLEGAL LOGGING; A KEY TO DEFORESTATION OVER THE GLOBE By - Prerana V Acharya

MULTIPLE IMPACTS OF ILLEGAL LOGGING; A KEY TO DEFORESTATION OVER THE GLOBE

Authored By - Prerana V Acharya,

B.A.L.L.B Hons, School Of Law,

Christ Deemed To Be University,

Bangalore Karnataka

ABSTRACT

Globally, illegal logging is a problem because it has serious negative effects on the environment, society and economy, including deforestation, loss of biodiversity, and decreased tax income. The issue persists despite recent international attempts to stop illicit forestry practices. Although there is a lot of scholarly literature on the topic, the causes of illegal logging have not been thoroughly studies. This study fills the knowledge vacuum by logging. The primary activities of Illegal logging are highlighted in this paper. With greater emphasis on the important deforestation affected regions; Indonesia, Bangladesh, Australia, Pakistan, India and peninsular Malaysia. Despite the focus of the conversation being the term ‘social, economic, environmental and governance implications’ must be emphasized. The path towards environmental ideals, the economy and welfare is paved with deforestation. Despite all the efforts made to combat illegal logging, the outcomes are far from adequate. Furthermore, governments and business must implement the triple bottom line concept in order to achieve sustainability.

KEYWORDS: Forest degradation, Forestry sector, Local people, Deforestation, illegal logging.

DISCUSSION

The effects of illegal logging are catastrophic for the world’s forests. Deforestation, the loss of biodiversity, and the acceleration of climate change are some of its repercussions. As a result, there is social unrest among the indigenous and local communities, which fuels crime, violence, and violations of human rights. for millions of plants and animals species, ancient forests and developed over thousands of years distinctive and essential habitats. Millions of people who depend on them for their lives and subsistence dwell there as well.   Deforestation is the practice of removing wood from earth’s surface using various tools and procedures for a variety of objectives. Such forest activities disrupt the local climatic and ecological systems. For their daily needs almost 1.6 billion people rely on forest resources. Tropical forests are highly valued and acknowledged on a national and international scale. The majority of the forest are being cut, and the situation is worrying. Deforestation and forest degradation are slow process that accelerates at an alarming rate. One of the main environmental issues in developing nations is deforestation. Many species will become extinct if deforestation continues unchecked Meyerson.[1] Illegal logging is a significant contributor to deforestation and typically involves one or more of the following transgression: taking endangered or protected species for commercial gain, infringing on regulations pretaining to the volume of logging and a logging area or other legal requirements. Logging using fake or unauthorized permissions, causing damage to trees making them susceptible to being injured legal, evading taxes overvaluing and processing timber without a permit and proper documentation and acquiring timber at a price over than the market rate White.[2] Unauthorized forest activities result in deforestation, disenfranchisement of locals, environmental deterioration, and increased fraud. Calculating the difference between the total amount of wood harvested and the total amount of wood consumed allows one to determine the worth of illegal wood cutting. The amount of wood being illegally harvested is ten times greater than the amount of wood being legally gathered. According to the research of Royal institute for international affairs, ten times as much money spent on illegal forest activities worldwide. Unofficial wood cutting can be estimated using a variety of techniques, including wood flow analysis, interview based data and statistical comparisons of import and export. The quantity of illegal harvested wood varies according to the supply and demand for Wood Peck.[3]

MAIN IMPACTS:

Socio-Economic Impacts:

Due to the lack of ownership rights for forest communities in many parts of the world caused by the destruction of forests, there is a great deal of pressure on these groups. This will compel them to move to a denser population. Due significantly diverse local communities and interests ambiguous relationships between land owners lzursa et al.[4]

Illegal logging id being done in several places across the World, and causing forests to be destroyed. The Social and Economic Effects a result of extensive illegal logging activities are listed below:

Drought, loss of traditional cultures, desertification, and rising run off, economic harm, diminished soil fertility, violation of human rights and rise in the number of homeless persons Reboredo[5]

Social Impact is a broad category of impact. The most significant aspect is that it disrespects a country’s law and authority and is connected to corruption. The right of the land owners in the forest communities are weakened. There is a problem with the identification of how resources and land are used, resulting in harm to nearby populations.  Such as these woodlands are several people’s homes and pose a threat to them. Conflict- causing want and way of life. Conflicts on a national or regional level may be finance by the money made from these unlawful operations. Many places around the world including Liberia, Myanmar, Cambodia and many other engage in practice. Conflicts over timber in Indonesia can result in property damage, injuries and even fatalities. Through the massive amount of wood being imported and developing Reboredo Plantations, China’s rapidly expanding economy is placing significant pressure on wood consumption. When trees are cut down without permission and then transported abroad the government suffers financial losses in a variety of ways. Smugglers fail to pay taxes and duties, or to put it in another way they loose money through corruption.  

Environmental Impact

The world is seeing a high amount of deforestation as a result of illegal logging. Illegal logging is occurring at a massively disastrous level, transforming the woods into grasslands. There has been a noticeable loss in both animal and plant species. Illegal logging practices in protected regions can result in the uncommon kinds of animals plants are in danger Reboredo. Damaging floods, ruined landscapes, contaminated air, and drinking water can result due to deforestation. Deforestation has its wide range of impacts in respect to biodiversity, which leads also towards the extinction of species due to the falling in the amount of tree count.

Governance Impact

The forest department must seek to reduce forest-related criminality and should also asses and balance the issues that forest-dwellers encounter in order to ensure equity. Illegal logging and mining in the asia-pacific region has been recognized as crime against environment. The fact that the Indonesian ministry of forestry has criticized for granting special treatment for the timber industry. Liberia’s president is to blame for funding the military operations there. Such conflict timber was used by Charles Taylor to undermine Guinea. Ivory Coast and Sierra Leone. About 200 people in the previous 10 years because in the democratic republic of the congo, forest rangers perished considering the approximately US 28 million trade in charcoal and the threat to its habitat both humans and gorillas. Because of the following timber.

Conflict develops;

• When the government and the military are involved
• Some opportunities are reduced also because of financial problems
• When timber and land resources are uncertain
• When there are fewer options for the implementation of legal system. Sheikh, el al. [6]

ROLE OF MEDIA

By raising public knowledge of both this issue and the commerce in wood conducted by illegal logging, the media positively emphasized this issue. But in terms of unlawful logging, one thing to consider merely drawing attention to the issues does not imply that a change is going to happen immideately but notifying the issue to people are crucial. Media analysis aids in determining how this topic is being discussed in different countries or activities being used against. For both foreign and domestic research analyzing media from 2009 to 2012 is necessary. Analyses of national media sources use three internet resources to complete the task relating to unlawful logging. International media sources were accessed by online media database Factiva. Ultimately the findings indicated tat from a significant increase was seen in 2001, and a drop started in 2007. In media outlets worldwide posts from 2010 to 2012 are primarily written about palm reduction in oil production, general discussion of forests bringing up unlawful logging. This decrease in illicit logging also features in national media, however the only increase that can be seen is 2008 was the year Janssen, et al.[7]

COCNCLUSION

This review focuses on instances of illicit logging causing deforestation on a global scale, as well as the socio economic, environmental and political effects of theses occurrences. It draws attention to the element that in order to prevent such problem, we must evaluate our security measures. The attempt to develop conservation politics, will assist in monitoring on both the history and present forest cover. It will facilitate watching the increase in the encroachment surrounding the national park in numerous nations. The problem of deforestation is primarily tropical. The poor quality of data on deforestation has improved but continues to be a cause of disagreement and discussion. Although there are different and complex elements that contribute to deforestation, socio economic reasons and trade are the main one’s. deforestation affects the environment through biodiversity loss and disturbance of ecosystem processes, as well as the economy through disruption of ecosystem services and inefficient resource usage. The loss of traditional belief and practices and the dislocation of populations who depend on the forest may be the most terrible consequences. A variety of methods are needed to address the issue of deforestation, including the creation of an efficient worldwide network of protected areas to maintain forest biodiversity and the sincere adaptation of best practices for the management of forest resources. To ensure that forests are valued appropriately from an economic, social, and biological standpoint, legislation must ultimately be reformulated and decision-makers attitudes must shift.

[1] Meyerson FA (2004) population growth and deforestation; a critical and complex relationship. Population reference bureau, Washington, DC.

[2] White R (2018) Transnational Environmental crime and global security.

[3] Peck T 2001 The International Timber Trade, Elsevier

[4] Izursa JL,DR Tilley (2015) Dynamic eco industrial model of forest rich developing nations: applications to the Bolivian forestry sector and national economy.

[5] Rebored F 2013 Socio economic, environmental, and governance impacts of illegal logging. Environment systems and decisions.

[6] Tacconi L 2007 Decentralization, forest and livelihood; theory and narrative, global environmental change.

[7]Janssen TA, GK Ametsitsi, M Collins, Extending the baseline of tropical dry forest loss in Ghana (1984-2015) reveals drivers of major deforestation inside a protected area.