Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-09-23-Speech-2-419"
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"en.20080923.40.2-419"2
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".
Mr President, the destruction of tropical forests continues unabated. Thirteen million hectares per year or one football pitch per second – that is the area of forest which is disappearing from the world each year. This is happening despite the fact that the first timber agreement came into being as long as 20 years ago. In 2006, the International Tropical Timber Agreement was signed. Although the agreement is general in its scope and leaves something to be desired, at least it provides a tool for us to tackle the problem.
Mrs Lucas has drawn attention to this, and her much-needed amendments will give us a better means of protecting tropical forests. I would like to put a question directly to the Commission. Mrs Lucas said in her introduction that the entire European Parliament is waiting for legislation from the Commission to combat illegal logging. When shall we get this legislation on illegal logging? Is it true that the Commission already voted on this matter in May this year? Why then have we not got to see anything? You did not touch on this in your speech, but we in Parliament want to know about it. What has happened to the legislative proposal? Please give us an explanation.
Otherwise I thank Mrs Lucas for highlighting the whole problem of trade in timber. Is it really reasonable that so much forest has to be cut down and the produce exported? My own country, Sweden, is the EU’s most densely forested country. At the same time we import one sixth of all the timber we consume. Why? Obviously because it is very cheap to buy timber on the world market. Mrs Lucas wants to do something about this and asks the EU to support countries which adopt strategies to protect their tropical forests. Quite right, a very good proposal.
Another measure which Mrs Lucas touched upon is to attach conditions to trade agreements and ensure that both European businesses and producers in the south have a responsibility to live up to, and that international conventions and agreements are observed. The idea is that international trade should be put to use – as a tool to promote sustainability and development throughout the world.
Another dimension of deforestation which is too little debated is the meat industry. A large part of the meat and animal feed consumed in the world comes from land that was previously covered by forest. Meat production is one of the main causes of forest destruction in Amazonas. The Chairman of the United Nations Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, recently called for a reduction in meat consumption. He is quite right in doing so. Here then is another question for the Commission: when will there be a strategy for reduced meat consumption? As I mentioned earlier, Mrs Lucas is also right in most of what she says in her report. The European United Left Group therefore supports this excellent report."@en1
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