January 1998
Christoph Meyer and Peter Gerhardt
The destruction of the rain forest seems of little interest to the European media. While there is passing interest in the proposed introduction of a rainforest-friendly label for tropical hardwoods in the UK, the Netherlands and Germany, there seems little concern that a new tropical hardwood boom has developed among French architects The new national library in Paris, which was opened by President Mitterand at the end of 1995 used:
Many consumers seem to take the view that the rainforest problem has been solved. Indeed a typical phone call to an environmental organisation these days might be "Can I buy new hardwood garden furniture? The teak is said to come from plantations..."
No one, least of all the European media, seems to be aware that the final act of destruction of the tropical rainforests has already begun. This could be because it's happening in South East Asia.
In the late 1980s, the main consumer of tropical hardwood was Japan (35% of global consumption), followed by the European Union (21%, of which France took the most). Consumption has now stabilised in Japan and Europe, while South East Asian countries like China, Taiwan and South Korea are fast becoming consumer states.
In the late 1980s, the main countries which produced tropical hardwood were Malaysia and Indonesia, both primarily exploiting the forests of Borneo (the source of 80% of globally traded tropical hardwoods in 1987).
Malaysia and Indonesia are still the main sources, but their share is decreasing rapidly as their forests run low and both countries are now trying to limit the quantities they export. Malaysia has been partially successful, but Indonesia has failed to control illegal felling. Consequently, South East Asian timber companies - again, mainly of Malaysian and Indonesian origin - are switching to other countries where there are less severe export restrictions. Malaysian companies are currently active in Belize, Brazil, Guyana, Cambodia, Cameroon, Madagascar, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Surinam, Vanuatu, and Zimbabwe.
According to a study by the International Tropical Timber Organisation (ITTO), in the late 1980s, 99% of the world's tropical timber comes from ruthless exploitation practices. It is difficult to estimate the extent to which commercial felling of tropical hardwoods contributes to global deforestation. The tropical hardwood trade claims that 'poor forestry practices' are a minor factor in rain forest destruction - accounting for only between 2 and 10%, while they claim agriculture and firewood production are of greater significance. The flaw in their arguments is that they equate the relatively small areas of rich tropical forests, which are seriously affected by felling, with all other woodland in the tropics. Such woodland includes the dry forests which are not important for the international timber trade and which are affected by a wide variety of factors.
More important than direct felling is indirect damage caused by the 'door opener effect' in regions of Africa, South East Asia and Central America. By clearing 'timber aisles', forestry opens up inaccessible forest to agriculture, often using population pressure as a validation. If there is a shortage of land for subsistence agriculture it is much more likely to be as a result of the use of the best land for the cultivation of cash crops.
The world's most intensive commercial felling has taken place in the province of Sarawak in Borneo. While the pressure on Sarawak is partially the result of Malaysian forestry policy, it has more to do with the fact that the dominant species of the commercially profitable Dipterocarpaceae family (known as Meranti in the trade). Nearly all the trees of sufficient diameter can be used, which means, on average, 8 to 10 trees per hectare.
According to experts, the average destruction rate caused by conventional felling in Sarawak is 60 per cent. This means that 60 per cent of the vegetation is destroyed through felling aisles and through damage to trees not used. Although the forest recovers somewhat in the standard 25 year interval before the second felling, after a third felling cycle, the forest no longer recovers. According to the Malaysian Ministry of Forestry, felling gave a yield of 16.6 million cubic metres of round timber in 1992, affecting 300,000 hectares of forest.
Most of the Sarawak forest is now seriously damaged or has been totally destroyed. According to the Ministry of Forestry, the remaining area of useful tropical forest is 7.3 million hectares. In contrast, the Swiss tropical timber organisation 'Bruno Manser Fonds' suggests that the area of useful primary forest has decreased from 5.9 million hectares in 1990 to 2.4 million hectares today. There is also some degraded secondary forest, where felling will not be possible for another 25 years.
With this depletion of resources, timber production in Sarawak has declined steeply over the past two years. In the boom years, Chinese-Malaysian family timber enterprises, (who get on well with Malaysian politicians), have accumulated wealth and have invested heavily in large capacity felling equipment which must not be allowed to lie idle. Thus, their crawler tractors and timber lorries are now roaring in other countries like Papua New Guinea.
According to estimates, 86 per cent of all the timber exports from Papua New Guinea are managed by a single Malaysian enterprise and its network of subsidiaries. The subsidiaries fell whatever they can use from the communal forests of the coastal villages as fast as they can. The social climate is explosive, so capital expenditure is limited to the minimum level necessary to get the raw timber out of the country. In some cases, they even work through the night under floodlights.
The destruction rate often approaches 80% - leaving barely one fifth of the original vegetation after felling. (Incidentally, FAO statistics classify a forest as destroyed only if more than 90% of the vegetation has disappeared.)
"From afar, we already hear the bursting wood and the roaring diesel engines. An aisle, blindly broken through the thicket, shows us the way. The crawler tractor is dragging long logs through streams and up steep hillsides. The ground is vibrating, the chains are grinding the red soil. Young trees that are in the way are pulled down. What remains of the forest are a thinned mess of single trees, burst trunks, the green of ragged creepers and muddy red soil."
Eyewitness report from the communal forests of the villages of Kui and Buso, province of Morobe, Papua New Guinea, 1992
In West and Central Africa, both the ecological conditions and the structure of the timber trade differ from those in South East Asia. Here, the timber trade has traditionally been dominated by European groups - mainly French, Italian and German - who supply the European market with raw material for high quality products. There is a great variety of species and thus of timber qualities of which only a few kinds of luxury wood are good enough for the European market. The German enterprise Glunz, for example, or its subsidiary Isoroi in Gabon usually fells only two trees per hectare for okum wood (which was one of the hardwoods used in the French national library). For two trees, an average of one hectare has to be cleared for transport aisles. Thus, compared with yield, the destruction rate is high. Large-scale interference may also have a severe effect on the game population by for example, illegal but necessary hunting for the provisioning of the woodcutter camps. Nevertheless, importers of tropical timbers like to call this 'sustainable forest management', because the forests are supposed to regenerate quickly. In practice, this 'selective' felling in densely-populated regions of Africa does not result in sustainable forestry because, after the felling, settlers move into the cleared woods. For this reason West Africa has lost nearly all of its forests and the timber economy is now concentrating on Central Africa.
Recently, more and more South East Asian enterprises have applied for concessions in Africa in order to supply their domestic markets with large quantities of timber used mainly in the production of paper and cardboard. Observation in Cameroon indicates that they use many more species, and that this often results in almost complete deforestation.
In Brazil, international attention has focused on the illegal felling of mahogany in Indian reservations, but the timber economy is not a significant cause of deforestation here.
However, things are changing. Again, South East Asian groups have secured large concessions in Brazil. Wherever felling has begun, the familiar procedures are repeated: with high capital investments, as much timber as possible is removed within the shortest possible time. These practices, by foreign conglomerates have caused the relatively undeveloped domestic forest industry to cooperate with Brazilian environmentalists. On the insistence of the environmentalists, it now tends towards modest operations so that it can argue against the 'foreigners' with its 'sustainable forestry' practices.
In precolonial times, forests were left to the local indigenous population who lived in harmony with the forests. The forests yielded the necessities for daily life. Today, where tropical forests and their inhabitants remain intact, many different products are still harvested regularly. Fruits, nuts, roots, vegetables, different starchy plants, mushrooms, honey, edible game, reptiles, insects and fish are all harvested or caught for food. An incredible number of medicinal plants and animals are recognised. Seeds and seedlings are collected along with dyes, resins, wood and other materials for the production of housing materials, tools, and jewellery. For forest dwellers the forest also has great spiritual significance.
With a few exceptions, colonial governments totally destroyed this balance. The forests were subject to the government and the population no longer had the right of usufruct ('The right of enjoying the use or advantage of another's property short of destruction or waste of its substance'), especially for wood. This was justified on the basis of the 'tragedy of the commons' which contends that nobody feels responsible for common property, and therefore has little interest in its maintenance. The colonial power, as patron, thought it should protect and manage the forests in a responsible way and so European ideas were applied to the tropics. One such idea developed in Germany was 'sustainable forest management' - sustainable with regard to the wood yield - which was established in India, Burma, and especially in Java. The teak plantations of Java, once managed by Dutch colonists, date from that era. With decolonisation, this legal point of view was adopted everywhere by the now independent states. The state became the proprietor of the forests and granted the right of usufruct (generally to those who could pay the most). Most of today's tropical forest management - with the exception of wild exploitation - is based on this German model of sustainability.
The consequences can be seen all over the world today. Unless the government protects forests, landless farmers conquer them, changing them into arable land. In the Indonesian countryside, the rural population defends itself against the claims of the forest administration by 'illegal' felling and sometimes by the sabotage of plantations of quick growing trees. In Malaysia, the federal state of Sarawak achieved global notoriety as a result of the Penan indigenous peoples' resistance against the timber companies. This formerly nomadic people settled in the rain forest and have defended themselves and their interests by blockades and other non-violent action. Their resistance has gradually been broken by increasingly harsh military means.
Worldwide trade in timber and timber products has increased considerably during recent decades. According to the UNEP (United Nations Environment Program), between 1966 and 1988, international production of conifer timber increased by 30% and of leaf-wood timber by 50%. This trend has continued into the 1990s.
The reasons for this trend are twofold. Firstly there is an increased demand by Northern industrial countries and the growing economies of South East Asia. Secondly, more efficient felling techniques have resulted in cheaper and more plentiful supplies. Countries of the former Soviet Union have also begun to supply timber to the world market.
As with all international trade, the timber trade has become increasingly globalised and concentrated. Big enterprises have taken over their weaker competitors and achieved large concessions in those countries where the government has given up the function of forest management. The trade in timber from northern forests is today dominated by a small number of multinational concerns. The flow of exports is becoming greater and greater and increasingly difficult to track. In the South, where South East Asian enterprises still dominate the timber trade, takeovers are occurring but not yet to the same extent as in the North. Quantity versus quality
There has also been a shift in the relative quantities of different timber qualities which are traded internationally. There has been an increase in the proportion of lower qualities for the production of chipboard and medium density fibreboard, as well as for industrial raw materials like woodchips for the cellulose and paper industries.
Demand is high for those kinds of timber for which processing can be automated, with a particular emphasis on timber of uniform dimensions which can be supplied from plantations. Because large dimensions, mechanical properties and outward appearance are no longer important factors, there is a global expansion of plantations of Pinus radiata, Eucalyptus, and other quick-growing species.
There has been a decrease in trade in high quality timber, such as that required for veneer or construction. These require straight and even logs of large dimensions, which come from old forest trees and, as we have seen, sources of easily accessible old forests are now limited. The shortage of large trees for construction has been overcome by technical developments such as lamination which improve the static qualities of wood by the controlled application of heat and pressure.
The general trend in forest management, is the move towards quantity rather than quality. Trees that might not have been considered useful some years ago and which therefore were left in situ, have now become of economic interest. Nearly all the trees in a felling area can now be used if the appropriate extraction equipment is available. Forest management is thus becoming more capital-intensive and the markets are becoming more concentrated in the hands of a few companies.
This trend often works against the local population, who cannot profit from industrial forest production, and who have therefore in some cases sabotaged plantation developments. From an ecological point of view, large monocultures in the tropics are bad news: they need a variety of pesticides; they speed up erosion; and after two or three harvest cycles the soil is often completely degraded. Thus, they do not, as is supposed, provide sustainable timber production.
Environmentalists advise that such plantations should either not to be planted as monocultures in the first place, or that they should be allowed to develop into a near-natural state. If plantations are established with a view to fulfilling the needs of the local population, they can help to relieve natural forests. Local craftsmen and small-scale industry can also relieve the pressure on natural forests by making use of the wood of exhausted rubber or cocoa plantations. Development organisations pin great hope on agroforest systems which consist of mixed forests alongside the cultivation of food products. The key to sustainable exploitation of forest resources is the direct involvement of the local population.
Until the 1970s, unfinished tropical hardwood trunks dominated the world market. The finishing and thus the main increase in value took place in the industrialised countries. This trend has changed with industrialisation in the South. Malaysia has promoted its own industry of semi-finished products like square section planks, and Indonesia has created the world's biggest capacity for the production of plywood. This is reflected in the foreign trade statistics of the Federal Republic of Germany. In the early 1980s, plywood imports were only 8% of all tropical timber imports, whereas by the mid-1990s, they accounted for almost one third.
In the late 1980s, the percentage of finished goods imported from the South also began to rise. Low-priced furniture - especially garden furniture and kitchen utensils - are increasingly made from tropical hardwoods.
Because figures quoted by the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN) do not yet refer to finished wooden products, this trend in the international timber trade cannot be documented statistically.
At the beginning of this decade, there was a decline of imports into Europe followed by a slight increase in 1993. Some of the decrease was undoubtedly due to public resistance to tropical hardwoods in Europe. However, economic and fashion trends are far stronger factors - the smallest decrease having been evident in France, where boycott appeals have been largely ignored. The slight upturn in 1993 is again mainly caused by France - possibly as a consequence of the tropical hardwood boom following the construction of the prestige national library building.
Multinational concerns, with the aid of their subsidiaries, profit from almost uncontrollable capital transfer. A common method of avoiding taxes and duties is 'transfer price manipulation'. The parent company supplies its legally independent subsidiary with equipment, licences, services or credits at excessive prices. The subsidiary carrying out the felling exports the timber at low prices to another subsidiary in a low-tax country. It is re-exported to the parent company with margins which are sometimes greater than 100%. Thus, profits remain in the low-tax country, whereas the subsidiary in the producer country shows continued losses and need not pay taxes. A side-effect is that these permanent losses discourage locals from engaging themselves with such companies.
No investigation has given a clearer demonstration of the methods of the tropical hardwood industry than that of a 1989 government commission under Judge Thomas Barnett in Papua New Guinea. This revealed much more than transfer price manipulation. The industry as a whole was described as working on the brink of criminality. None of the companies examined could furnish proof that it had abided by regulations or kept to its contracts. The political dimension was particularly explosive The commission found not a single case where the authorities had punished recognisable offences by withdrawing licences or claiming compensation. Politicians and officers had themselves reaped the benefits from the industry. Some had acted in a liaison role for the foreign companies, some owned shares in companies, and some even owned companies themselves. The commission identified the local population as the clear losers, since they lost their most important resource and received in return relatively low compensation payments with no opportunity for long-term profit.
Shortly after the publication of the report, a former timber trader who had been defeated by international competition complained to Australian rainforest environmentalists that the unfathomable structures of the international timber trade had resulted in operations which were not subject to law. It was impossible to make 'honest' deals.
Other common practices are false declarations of export quantities and qualities or the changing of declaration en route so that protected species are disguised. Moreover, large quantities mysteriously acquire an 'eco-label' en route. In times of growing environmental consciousness in Europe, the timber trade is making every effort to overcome customer resistance to rainforest products..
Despite frequent statements to the contrary, finished wooden articles carry low tarriffs. The import of timber and wooden articles is subject only to EU customs regulations. There is no 'skimming' as is the case with many agricultural products. Unprocessed round timber may be imported duty-free, and with increased processing, duty only rises to 1 or 2 per cent. Preference is given to the ACP countries (countries of Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific associated with the EU by the Lom Agreement) and to developing countries with weak economies.
Far more effective trade barriers to tropical timber are consumer boycotts and local authority embargos on the use of tropical hardwoods. These have resulted from an unprecedented campaign by environmental groups in the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. To date over a thousand communities - among them cities like Berlin and Frankfurt - have publicly declared embargos on the use of tropical hardwoods in municipal building projects. This applies particularly to doors and windows, and to outdoor projects like bridges and park benches.
Although the embargo has had a significant effect on imports into Europe (see graph), it has had little impact on the volumes traded globally.
In the context of the final declaration of the Rio Summit in 1992, one has to ask whether it is necessary to ship huge quantities of tropical timber around the world. Agenda 21 requires that materials be sourced as closely as possible to the point of use.
Furthermore, tropical hardwoods can almost always be substituted by domestic hardwoods. The main reason why tropical species are specified is because they are so cheap. European species with comparable characteristics of density, resilience and resistance to atmospheric effects are much more expensive. With the exception of a very few special requirements, industrialised countries could manage perfectly well without tropical timber. Many indigenous peoples whose culture depends on the forest also abhor commercial felling. Consequently, the boycott appeal was backed by many representatives of these indigenous peoples as well as by environment groups from the South.
The decrease in tropical hardwood imports did not - as is sometimes claimed - cause an increase in felling. It has been argued that, because timber prices had dropped, felling had to increase in order to compensate for foreign exchange losses. However, at least in the cases of the main producer countries like Malaysia and Indonesia, there was little evidence of this, since there are a multitude of reasons for international price fluctuations. Export losses in the trade with Europe, could be compensated by increase in demand elsewhere.
However, the boycott was effective as a political signal. In response, Malaysia declared itself the speaker for all the tropical hardwood producing countries and accused the environmentalists of the North of eco-protectionism. Malaysia argued that the natural woods of the North had been destroyed long ago and that Northern countries therefore had no right to dictate how the South should use their forests.
The Malaysian government's approach to its indigenous peoples, (especially the Penan, whose motto is 'You got the world - let us keep the forest') was a decisive factor in the call for a boycott of tropical hardwoods by Northern environmentalists.
"Don't get excited about the human rights of 400 people!", barked the Malaysian ambassador in a panel discussion during the timber fair INTERZUM in Cologne in May, 1993, referring to the Penan. "These 400 people oppose progress and therefore oppose a large majority of the population."
The timber trade has always insisted that felling was good for the forests. They argue that, because the forests are useful, they are precious and will therefore be protected. The main causes of destruction are not the timber trade, but others, especially the requirement for agricultural land by the landless population. Poverty and overpopulation are the basic problem, and can only be solved through economic development, which comes from the foreign exchange earnings of timber sales.
The timber trade is, nevertheless, unable to furnish proof that most tropical hardwood comes from "adequate" forest management with forest recovery and a local population living sustainably.
In Germany in late 1991, the association of timber importers promised to develop a labelling project for 'environmentally appropriate forestry'. After a transition period, a certificate was to guarantee ordinary forestry. (In the meantime, the consumer should continue buying tropical timber.)
At about the same time, a number of different labels appeared on tropical hardwood products in the shops. These guaranteed 'no damage to the tropical rain forests' without reference to tests or criteria. In producer countries, too, accreditation certificates were suddenly issued. This was evidently on the initiative of the timber traders or governments, who hoped to (re-)conquer the lucrative market in the environmentally conscious industrialised countries of North America and Europe. But all those labels lacked, and still lack, the crucial characteristic of trustworthiness.
It is not only governments or big business which wants to continue to sell timber. Local initiatives, village producers, rural artisans or co-operatives working in an ecologically acceptable way need a guaranteed outlet in rich countries. Fortunately there are a small number of examples of forest preservation through community level forestry (See below). The reliable labelling of such products could be a solution, helping to distinguish products that contribute to sustainable forestry from 'exploitative timber'.
On an international level, the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) with its internationally binding minimum requirements (see box) is the only creditworthy initiative which combines the protection of the forest and human rights with the timber economy:
In practice, there are organisational deficiencies:
The economic dependence of the advisory organisations on the timber company might also call into question the independence of the certification.
The proportion of FSC certifited timber on the European market is still quite small. It is not yet at a stage when it can be recommended unreservedly, since the monitoring systems need to be tightened. If this cannot be achieved, FSC certification will lose credibility with consumers.
A number of European organisations exist whose objective is to promote community or co-operative initiatives among the rural population in the countries of the South. By marketing the timber in Europe they aim to preserve forests which are managed in ecologically appropriate ways. The best known projects are in the Solomon Islands and in Papua New Guinea. In contrast to many other tropical countries, land rights here remain largely in the hands of communities. However, contact with western life styles has created new demands for material goods. In this context, local people are easily enticed by offers from large timber companies to exploit the precious species in the community forests. In return, they promise not only to pay a good price for the timber, but also to build roads, schools, medical centres and to create jobs. After often heated debates at community level, a contract is signed, because for many villagers 'development' is the goal, and selling timber is a way to achieve it.
European initiatives involve encouraging the villagers to take on forest management themselves. If they can understand how to realise the value of all their forest resources, they will preserve their forest. This is the main incentive for the villagers - and the most important argument in favour of independent development of each village community. On the Solomon Islands, communities are already involved in large-scale exports, whereas in Papua New Guinea local sales for domestic consumption prevail.
Within its Ecoforestry Program, the Australian "Rain forest Information Centre" (RIC) draws up contracts with communities in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. It sponsors portable sawmills and appropriate training courses, while the community agrees to prevent the timber companies from entering their land and to observe the following guidelines of forest management:
The timber is bought by certain European or Australian companies at a price above world market level, the profit per cubic metre of trimmed timber thus being many times higher than would be normally be paid.
As development-oriented import organisations, members of EFTA must face the fact that the importing of endangered renewable raw materials has ecological as well as economic implications. In cooperation with producer organisations, fair trade organisations are trying to establish criteria for the sustainable handling of their materials. Environmental protection which ignores the producers' interests is bound to fail as are all initiatives which favour of an "ecologically clean" exploitation of tropical hardwoods.
EFTA members prefer to promote the production of and trade in finished wooden products rather than in raw timber. Handicraft production means that value is added in the country of origin and fair trade criteria guarantee that this is directly to the producers' benefit.
In India, for example, only about 2.5% of annual felling is used for carvings, but it can secure the subsistence of thousands of families. If they are denied access to their raw material their existence is threatened. In May 1997, the 'Pioneer' newspaper in the state of Uttar Pradesh published the following headline: "Closure of sawmills makes 60,000 craftspeople redundant". What had happened? At the urgent request of several environmental organisations, the Supreme Court of India had given orders for the investigation of forestry authorities, who were suspected of felling trees in the ecologically sensitive rain forests of the region. The closure of the sawmills was intended to put an end to this illegal timber trade. The many enterprises affected included those in Saharanpur which comply with the law and only process timber from local plantations. It transpired that although the sawmills of Saharanpur had paid the prescribed licence fees, they had not received formal registration. This failure on the part of the authorities now seemed likely to cause permanent mass unemployment. The enterprise 'Toyin Woodcraft India' (see box) in Saharanpur, a trading partner of many EFTA members, had to inform their European clients that their orders could not be fulfilled due to a lack of raw material. It was only after several petitions and a public campaign by the 'Woodcarving Manufacturing Association', that production could start again.
The FSC label does not distinguish between a multinational group and a village communityas long as the forest is managed according to FSC principles. In fair trade, however, people matter. They need to ask who makes use of the forest. As a development approach for the strengthening of marginalised populations wanting to protect and use their forests, fair trade has many advantages.
Principles for environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable management of the world's forests.
In view of the multiplicity of certificates for sustainable forest management on the international market, a superior body is needed to set internationally binding minimum standards for the accreditation organisations. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), founded in Toronto in 1993, wishes to fulfil this function. It does not itself grant certificates. These are given by advisory organisations accredited to the FSC whose certification standards have to be based on the 10 FSC principles.
Within the FSC, environmental organisations, social groups and economic interests have an equal share in basic decisions.
After lengthy negotiations between the Council's interest groups, nine principles have now been published. These refer to social, ecological, legal and economic aspects of forest management, stringent supervisory methods including trade routes, and they apply to all kinds of forest. A tenth principle on plantations is still under discussion.
"Saharanpur, a town 150 km north of New Delhi. A walk around the place shows that this is a centre of wood manufacturing. But above all, Saharanpur is a centre of child labour! In nearly every workshop, we can see boys busy with the production of bread boards, wooden boxes and other articles - cheap mass production articles for our department stores and supermarkets. The small child's hands are especially useful for fine inlaid work. An eight year old boy tells us that he works between eight and ten hours a day, six days a week. His weekly wage is 10 Rupees. If he reaches adulthood and has children of his own, they too will be unlikely to escape from this system of 'bonded labour'.
Toyin, an EFTA partner, has challenged this oppressive system. We can only appreciate the social standards of this enterprise when we contrast the conditions within it with the bitter realities 'outside'. In the central workshop of Toyin, between 130 and 150 workers are employed on a regular basis. They include young people, but no children under 14 years of age. According to skill, wages differ, but none are below the legal minimum. The workshop is light, airy and spacious, and each working place is well illuminated." These impressions were gathered on a trip to India in September 1995. As a result Gepa, the German fair trade organisation, established a pilot project with Toyin for the development of social and ecological minimum standards in the wood sector.
An independent study was first carried out on behalf of both partners. The development of standards must involve all parties, rather than being dictated from Europe. In a further step, pressure is to be exerted on the sector to stop child labour and the violation of workers' rights.
Another reason why this venture is a pilot project is that Toyin, which was originally a co-operative of wood carvers, has converted into a private enterprise with five share holders. Some EFTA members disapprove of this development and have stopped ordering, but there is no doubt that social improvements are badly needed, particularly for producers in the private sector. Being a 'normal' market partner in the region, Toyin can demonstrate that economic production and social standards are not incompatible. The fair trade organisations, for their part, can explain to customers that respect for people and the environment must be reflected in the price of the products.
Djembés are traditional drums found in a variety of forms in several Western African countries. A traditional orchestra has, besides the soloist, two or three Djemb players and up to three bass drummers. The drums are particularly popular among European musicians who are interested in authentic instruments
Usually, the instruments are made by the musicians themselves, for only they can give the drum the 'soul' it needs for a good sound. The drums are produced from the trunks of the mango tree, a widespread and useful tree in West Africa. As long as it bears fruit, nobody thinks of felling it - only old trees are felled for wooden products. African drums are produced by a traditional production method for which the know-how and technology are passed from generation to generation.
Some fair trade organisations promote reforestation through assistance programmes and additional price payments. For example, Gepa in Germany pays an extra 5% of the cost price of the drums to the Gambian organisation 'Exchange Crossroads', and a cautious buying policy ensures that there will be no mass production of Djembs for export.
