Let’s not panic,

leaders say

By Akanisi Motufaga

PACIFIC Island leaders say their countries are not on the brink of disaster, as Australia put it when describing the region’s environment.

Prime ministers Sitiveni Rabuka and Paias Wingti said there were serious environment problems, but not too serious to warrant panic.

They both said that working together to resolve these problems was the way forward.

Solomon Islands Prime Minister Francis Billy Hilly has the same belief although he has a different strategy. Hilly said at the forum that his country would stop exporting round logs in a move to contain the exploitation of forests and to conserve the remaining trees.

Round logs exports make up more than 50 per cent of the country’s revenue. Although no dates have been set on the total ban, the Solomon Islands will have to rely more on foreign aid and diversify its products to survive.

Hilly said at the Forum in Brisbane last month that Australia had offered $2 million to help in the country’s structural adjustment programme.

“All we need is more assistance and less criticism,” he said. He added that exploitation of natural resources was a serious problem and that regional governments would be able to look after their own environmental problems if they were given assistance.

Hilly said his government intended to introduce processing of timber products once the total ban is in place. According to a United Nations report, logging in the Solomon Islands for export began in 1961. At the moment, half of the country’s viable forest resources have been logged with extraction rates doubled between 1991 to 1992.

The report said logging would not be sustained for more than eight years if the current extraction rate remains. It saia the annual sustainable yield was about 270,000 cubic metres, but that the logging licences granted catered for more than 1.4 million cubic metres annually.

“Reforestation will take 30-40 years in those areas that have been carefully logged,” the report said. “However, it is reported that there has been widespread disregard of environmental protection controls with the result that reforestation may take anything from 45 to 200 years. Significant under reporting of volumes and values has eroded the returns to Solomon Islands in the form of royalties and export taxes.”

Hilly said his government’s aim was to divert foreign exchange income from forest-related products to other areas. “It is a cause of grave concern to the government that because of our limited and narrow economic base, heavy empha sis is being placed on a very few resources to sustain the national economy,” Hill said.

“The government is anxious to implement sensible and practical policies that will enable sustainable management of this resource and the whole environment in general so that future generations of our people too can enjoy the benefits from that sector. The government is also serious in its efforts to diversify the productive sector and therefore divert the pressure away from the reliance on forestry for foreign exchange earnings,” Hilly said. U