To Date, 5 Million Ha Of Papua Rain-, Cloudforests Leased To Foreign Logging, Palm Oil Corporations

[hatrack]

During a meeting in March 2011 twenty-six experts—from biologists to social scientists to NGO staff—crafted a statement calling on the Papua New Guinea government to stop granting Special Agricultural and Business Leases. According to the group, these leases, or SABLs as they are know, circumvent Papua New Guinea's strong community land rights laws and imperil some of the world's most intact rainforests. To date over 5 million hectares (12.3 million acres) of forests have been leased under SABLs.

"Papua New Guinea is among the most biologically and culturally diverse nations on Earth. remarkable diversity of cultural groups rely intimately on their traditional lands and forests in order to meet their needs for farming plots, forest goods, wild game, traditional and religious sites, and many other goods and services," reads the statement, dubbed the Cairns Declaration.

However, according to the declaration all of this is threatened by the Papua New Guinea government using SABLs to grant large sections of land without going through the proper channels. Already 2 million (nearly 5 million acres) hectares of the leased land has been slated for clearing by the government's aptly named Forest Clearing Authorities.

EDIT

According to Laurance, the revenue made from these deals is not aiding poverty alleviation efforts in Papua New Guinea, but instead the profits are "mostly ending up in the hands of foreign corporations and political elites in Papua New Guinea." "For instance, local communities in Papua New Guinea are capturing only around $10 per cubic meter of kwila, one of their most valuable timbers, whereas the same raw timber fetches around $250 per cubic meter on delivery to China," explains Laurance, adding that, "many of the major socioeconomic indicators for Papua New Guinea have fallen in the past decade, indicating a decline in living standards even as the country is experiencing a huge resource boom."

EDIT

http://news.mongabay.com/2011/0323-hance_png_sabls.html

[Newest Reality]

1. Gee, that should have been cluing us in for a while ...

Other countries have been seeing all their natural wealth go into the grubby, greedy mitts of multinational corporations as their people sink deeper into poverty and desolation.

Maybe it will become clearer that this is what has been happening here, as well? Our financial cancer is eating us alive and, though it is nothing new, the symptoms bring a diagnosis. The prognosis is not good should the process continue. The condition many be fatal.

We must find a cure, or face the certain outcome. Surgery is in order.

[pansypoo53219]

2. greed is gonna extinct us

stupidity of humans finally gets us. cause it multiplied.