Timber industry raises flag
National ReportMarch 9, 2017By Andrew Kunambura, Political Reporter
Timber-new
Zimbabwe’s commercial timber forests, which showcase the country’s spectacular biodiversity, have become a haven for criminal activities.
- Miners, settlers ravage forest reserves
- Conflicting legislation fuelling situation
THE road bravely snakes through interlocking spurs, creating a memorable spectacle as it penetrates swanky forests dressing the high Chimanimani mountains.
Verdant commercial timber forests spread as far and wide as the eye can see.
Established in the 1960s to create a vibrant industry that gave birth to a unique economy, the forests have until now, satisfied construction, furniture and paper demands in the entire southern African region.
The forests are vanishing.
Zimbabwe’s commercial timber forests, which showcase the country’s spectacular biodiversity, have become a haven for criminal activities that are leaving a trail of environmental devastation.
Chimanimani district is one of the country’s few most bio diverse places in the country due to the variation in altitudes and climates — from high mountains to pristine natural and commercial timber forests which are home to many rich and varied ecosystems.
A visit into the dense jungles, however, reveals a sad situation where large swathes of timber plantations are being decimated by illegal miners who are relentlessly digging for gold from one side.
Besieging the forests from the other side, is an army of illegal settlers that has occupied the forests, rampantly uprooting, cutting and burning substantial coppices to prepare homes, thereby replacing foreign currency earning timberlands with subsistence crop fields.
The Forestry Commission of Zimbabwe (FCZ), which is the custodian of the country’s gazetted forests, is struggling to contain the situation as both the miners and settlers claim to have legal rights to the land.
An enquiry by the Financial Gazette established a legal conflict in the applicable legislation.
It would appear that three laws, namely the Forestry Act, the Mining Act and the Rural District Councils Act are conniving to endanger the entire timber industry through land degradation.
Commercial forestry plantations were gazetted as protected forests under the Forestry Act (Chapter 19:05) after government felt the country needed timber for construction.
The Act demarcates 15 plantation forests in Chimanimani, including Tarka and Tandayi forests, which are the worst affected, to ensure there is enough timber.
Sections 35 and 36 of the law states that no one has authority to de-gazette these forests without presidential approval, which means they cannot be used for anything else except for timber plantation.
However, despite such provisions, some of the miners operating in the protected forests claim to have mining licenses from government under the Mining Act, while the Chimanimani Rural District Council is charging timber companies US$3 per hectare levy per year, inclusive of land which has been invaded by gold diggers and settlers.
FCZ learnt of the scale of destruction in a multi-temporal satellite imagery assessment it conducted last year, which revealed that over 45 000 hectares of commercial timber plantations have been destroyed by gold miners and settlers in the last 10 years.
At just 200 000 hectares, commercial timber forests occupy 0,5 percent of Zimbabwe’s total land size of 39 million hectares.
The forest industry lost a total of 14 000 hectares of these forests in the last two years alone.
The timber industry is thus feeling the full effects as it is now on the brink of total collapse, with some companies such as Border Timbers, Mutare Board and Paper Mills and the Wattle Company already suffering heavy knocks.
Players in the industry have since raised the red flag and are calling for an all-stakeholders convention to address the situation.
Their concerns stem from the fact that timber forests are being destroyed at a faster rate than they can be replenished, and the country could be forced to import timber if urgent measures are not taken.
Zimbabwe has been able to satisfy local timber demand since 1986 and even produce surplus timber for export to Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique.
Zambia, Malawi and Botswana sorely rely on Zimbabwe for timber.
Also, there could be grave climatic consequences because the timber forests have helped combat effects of climate change through their carbon sequestration abilities.
There are also other environment dangers whereby gold panners are diverting river courses that flow through the forests to places where they use mercury and cyanide to extract the precious mineral before releasing the poisoned, murky water into Chisengu River, a tributary of the bigger Rusitu River whose waters are used by many communities downstream. Rusitu then carries the contaminated water into Mozambique, where authorities are understood to have raised concerns about the pollution by Zimbabwe of the shared water body.
At its peak in the 1990s, the timber industry directly employed around 50 000 people, but now manages just 5 000.
Towns and cities such as Mutare, Chipinge, Nyanga and Chimanimani have their foundations on the timber industry, on which their sustainability also depends.
It is a multi-million dollar industry which, despite being in a quandary, still contributes around four percent to the country’s Gross Domestic Product.
All this could be lost if urgent corrective action is not taken.
In fact, players said Zimbabwe had just enough timber to last the next nine years.
“We really have to think again and intensify our efforts to protect and manage the forests. We don’t want to impoverish ourselves,” said Allied Timbers of Zimbabwe (ATZ) chief executive officer (CEO), Dan Sithole.
“We are calling for political intervention. The diminishing commercial timber forest land is a result of leadership failure at local, district, provincial and national level. What is needed is a crisis indaba where we can all put our heads together to resolve the issue right now,” said Sithole.
The environmental degradation is causing the commercial timber forests to disappear fast, said Darlington Duwa, CEO of the Timber Producers Federation.
“The situation is really bad. Diversion of rivers where the terrain is steep and soils can be eroded easily is causing serious damage to the environment and in such a scenario, normal forest activity cannot take place,” he said.
“The mining grants must be reversed; we appeal to government to reconsider their issue and stop all mining operations in the gazetted forests.
“The industry has raised the red flag that Zimbabwe is bound to import timber if the situation is allowed to continue,” he added.
Forestry economist, Dominic Kwesha, said these areas are unique in that they are the only places where timber species such as wattle, pine and eucalyptus, can grow well.
“The exotic timber species which prefer high rainfall, cool temperatures and high altitude can only be grown in the Eastern Highlands and there is no room for expansion, especially given the imminent threats of climate change. The trees take up to 25 years to mature but the miners and settlers are destroying them at every stage of their development,” he said.
FCZ acting director general, Abednego Marufu, said: “Surely the industry has raised the red flag and as regulators, we are worried also by the illegal mining and settlement. They must be evicted immediately because they are causing serious land degradation.”
Permanent secretary in the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate, Prince Mupazviriho, promised that government would act on the illegal miners and settlers.
“We superintend the Forestry Act, which prohibits any activities in gazetted forests. That should not be happening. We are destroying that big economy of which there is no other business we can replace it with. If this continues, we are going to import timber in the next few years,” he said.
But the rampage is continuing unabated.
Tarka forest is literally under siege from miners and settlers alike.
The miners constitute by far the greatest danger.
They follow gold belts everywhere and cut down trees along their path.
Gullies are forming all over, while rivers are being silted and deformed.
They do not mind whether they are digging across a road or not; they are militant and violent.
At an area they have christened Mbare after Harare’s notorious suburb, a young man of about 20 was recently seen wiping rivulets of sweat from his brow as he dug for gold deep in a running gully.
He immediately picked up his tools, ran across the gully as soon as he noticed that there were strangers around, then resurfaced with two of his colleagues and stood at the opposite end of the huge gully, perhaps ready for war.
One of the gold panners, who identified himself simply as Brighton, shouted back answers fielded to the trio.
He said they had no options, but to dig for gold to survive.
“We are poor. We could die of hunger if we do not dig for gold. This is our only means of survival,” he shouted, very much appearing to be the most senior.
But their means of survival is chocking rivers and poisoning villagers in downstream Rusitu Valley in addition to destroying the forests.
“We just hear there are people digging for gold up in the mountains and causing this pollution,” said Fellistus Tafataona, whose home is close to Chisengu River on its way to the confluence with Rusitu River.
“I stopped using this water a few years ago when the pollution started and now I have to walk longer distances to get fresh water,” she said.
The villagers are also failing to get formal jobs due to diminishing commercial timber forests; companies would offer them menial jobs during harvesting time.
At another place, an unidentified prospective miner has moved in heavy mining machinery, including caterpillars, and reportedly only awaiting clearance before razing the thriving young eucalyptus trees nearby in search for gold.
According to one of the employees, who requested anonymity, the prospective miners discovered gold deposits beneath the lush green forests.
North of Tarka forests, settlements are springing up.
Kenneth Demberere, a forester with ATZ, said late last year, some new settlers used tractors to plough through five hectares of freshly planted pine trees and set fire on newly harvested timber as they cleared land for commercial farming.
“We reported them to the police. They were arrested and fined just US$20 for the offence. They have since returned and are continuing with their activities,” said Demberere.
The settlers, as much as the miners, boast of strong political connections.
The fox is in charge of the hen house when it comes to forest management in the once verdant district.
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