In the Battle to Save Forests, Activists Target Corporations
25 June 2010
Large corporations, not small-scale farmers, are now the major forces behind the destruction of the world's tropical forests. From the Amazon to Madagascar, activists have been directing their actions at these companies - so far with limited success.
by Rhett Butler
The image of
rainforests being torn down by giant bulldozers, felled by
chainsaw-wielding loggers, and torched by large-scale developers has
never been more fitting: Corporations have today replaced small-scale
farmers as the prime drivers of deforestation, a shift that has critical
implications for conservation.
Yet while industrial actors exploit resources more efficiently and cause
widespread environmental damage, they also are more sensitive to
pressure from consumers and green groups. As a result, activists have
more power today than ever to affect corporate behavior and slow the
dizzying pace of tropical deforestation worldwide. That power has been
on display in recent months, as campaigns by environmental groups have
forced major corporations to stop doing business with companies accused
of widespread deforestation.
Unilever, the consumer products conglomerate, and other corporations
recently canceled contracts with palm oil producers in Indonesia after
investigations by Greenpeace and the BBC revealed that these companies
were engaged in illegally clearing forests. Late last year and early
this year, a campaign by ecotourism companies and the conservation
group, Forests.org
- a Web-based activist group - succeeded in forcing some European
companies to stop trading in rare rosewood illegally logged in
Madagascar.
And since Greenpeace released a report last summer linking deforestation by cattle ranchers in
the Amazon to major consumer products, including Burger King hamburgers and Nike shoes, the fallout has been profound.
Now, major buyers of Amazon beef and leather goods, including Wal-Mart,
are insisting on new sourcing policies in Brazil requiring full
traceability and transparency from their suppliers to ensure that cattle
products aren't coming from former rainforest.
These developments illustrate an important shift in the battle waged by
conservation groups to slow the destruction of tropical forests. Yet
such success stories are not as clear-cut as they might appear at first
glance. In many cases, after an initial victory by environmentalists,
the forces driving deforestation have regrouped and are seeking ways
around corporate boycotts.
For decades, deforestation was mostly driven by poverty - poor people in
developing countries clearing forests or depleting other natural
resources as they struggle to feed their families. Government policies
in the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s helped drive this trend by subsidizing
agricultural expansion through low-interest loans, infrastructure
projects, and ambitious colonization schemes, especially in the Amazon
and Indonesia.
But over the past 20 years, this has changed in many countries due to
rural depopulation, a decline in state-sponsored development projects,
the rise of globalized financial markets, and a worldwide commodity
boom. Deforestation, overfishing, and other forms of environmental
degradation are now primarily the result of corporations feeding demand
from international consumers.
Seizing the opportunity to apply pressure on international corporate
giants, activists have recently launched campaigns worldwide to slow the destruction of
tropical forests. In 2008, Greenpeace ensnared Unilever - the world's
largest buyer of palm oil - in a scandal when Greenpeace claimed the
company's supplier was involved in forest destruction in Borneo. Hiring
an independent investigator, Unilever learned that the palm oil
supplier, Sinar Mas, was indeed illegally clearing rainforests and
carbon-dense peatlands.
Last December, Unilever canceled a $32.6 million contract with a
subsidiary of Sinar Mas, and earlier this year several more major buyers
dumped Sinar Mas. Unilever subsequently blacklisted Duta Palma after a
BBC documentary in February showed the Indonesian company was engaged in
clearing protected forest for palm oil plantations.
However, Unilever softened its stance in early April, as company
officials said they would consider buying palm oil from a Sinar Mas
subsidiary if the company demonstrated that it is no longer involved in
illegally logging forests.
In the Amazon, Greenpeace released the report last June linking
deforestation by cattle ranchers in the Amazon to major consumer
products, including Gucci handbags and Nike shoes. The fallout was
immediate: Brazil's cattle industry - the largest in the world and a
dominant force in Brazilian politics - was brought to a standstill
virtually overnight. Brazilian officials raided the offices of the
country's cattle giants and suspended or revoked some of their loans.
Several of the cattle companies' biggest buyers publicly rebuked the
firms and demanded greater accountability for their supply chains.
Wal-Mart, Nike, and Timberland - all identified in the report as buying
leather products or meat that came from cattle raised on deforested Amazon land -
immediately announced new sourcing policies requiring full traceability
and transparency from their suppliers to ensure beef and leather
products weren't coming from former rainforest. Under pressure from
their customers and the government - which threatened billions in fines -
Brazilian cattle producers, processors, and traders fell into line,
declaring moratoriums on deforestation. The hottest commodity in the
Brazilian Amazon became credible supply-chain management, spawning a
rush to develop certification systems and land registries for
"responsible" ranches.
"The industry - from Nike and Adidas to the slaughter plants - is under
pressure to have a clean supply chain," said John Carter, a rancher who
runs Alianca da Terra, a Brazilian NGO developing a certification system
for the cattle industry. "Greenpeace essentially created a federal
mandate that everyone had to come into compliance via a land registry.
Greenpeace changed the game."
Another potent example of the impact of international pressure on large
corporations comes from Madagascar, a treasure trove of biodiversity in
the Indian Ocean. In the aftermath of a military coup nearly a year ago,
Madagascar's rainforest parks have been besieged by
illegal loggers targeting valuable rosewood and other hardwoods. The
timber is usually transported by international carriers to Reunion
Island and Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, and then on to China, where it
is turned into furniture for export. Some of the wood ends up in Europe
and the United States.
Madagascar's coup leaders are apparently complicit in the lucrative
trade, making it difficult to address the issue on the ground. So the
pressure point for rosewood trafficking - at least in the short term -
is foreign shipping companies. Confronted by tour operators whose
business depends on national parks and wildlife, three companies -
Spanfreight, Safmarine, and UAFL - immediately stopped transporting
rosewood from Madagascar.
However, a French company, Delmas, continued carrying rosewood for
months, making it a clear target for environmentalists. When word leaked about an
impending shipment scheduled for late December, Forests.org seized on
the opportunity, bombarding the company and the French government with
thousands of messages, arguing that Delmas was undermining France's
negotiating position at climate talks in Copenhagen and facilitating the
destruction of Madagascar's national parks.
The campaign proved too much for Delmas, and in December the company
canceled a major rosewood shipment worth an estimated $20 million to $60
million to traders. However, the company resumed shipments in March,
prompting intensified campaigns by Forests.org and the Environmental
Investigation Agency, a conservation group. That pressure prompted the
government in Madagascar to accede to a ban on exports of rosewood and
precious timber for two to five years.
"It's really impressive that environmental activists have influenced a
major corporation such as Delmas," said William Laurance, a researcher
at James Cook University in Australia, who has analyzed the transition
from poverty-driven to industrial-driven deforestation. "Many
corporations are learning that it's bad business to engage in
environmentally poor practices."
But while the campaign achieved its short-term objective of blocking the
rosewood shipments, the subsequent response from traders reflects the
difficulties of going after corporate transgressors. For example, after a
consumer in Germany complained to authorities that Theodor Nagel &
Co., a major tropical timber importer based in Germany, was advertising
"Madagascar rosewood" on its Web site, the company replaced "Madagascar"
with "Brazilian." Nagel said it had the proper permits to import
rosewood from Madagascar, although conservationists note that many
export documents in Madagascar are fraudulent, and the company is now
under investigation.
Furthermore, traders in Madagascar are now reportedly looking for more
discreet ways to ship rosewood. They may find that channel through
Chinese freighters, whose owners have fewer qualms about international
criticism.
Greenwashing - or misrepresenting the environmental qualities of a
product - is another common strategy used by companies that come under
fire.
A prime example is the new emphasis by Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) - a
subsidiary of Sinar Mas - on being green. The company has long been
notorious in activist circles for its poor environmental record, but
major companies continued to buy from APP until consumer-oriented campaigns
led by the Rainforest Action Network, Forest Ethics, and WWF, among
others, accelerated a few years ago. In short order, some of APP's most
prominent buyers - including Staples, Office Depot, Wal-Mart, Woolworth,
and Gucci Group - canceled contracts with the company. In addition, the
Forest Stewardship Council, the green standard for certifying forest
products, severed its association with APP.
To stem the loss of customers, APP hired a leading PR firm and launched a
campaign rebranding itself as a leader in sustainability. Its new Web
site features bird sounds and verdant forests while proclaiming its
support for "economic, social, and environment sustainability." The
company also is running ads on CNN touting its green credentials.
"There's been a growing sense of risk in the marketplace around doing
business with APP," explained Lafcadio Cortesi, forest campaign director
at the Rainforest Action Network. "However, instead of responding to
customer demands for reform on the ground, APP has dramatically
increased their public relations activities and environmental claims."
For example, in response to concerns that the company's activities are
worsening global warming, APP hired consultants to draft a report
detailing the modest carbon footprint of its business. But that report
failed to account for the bulk of their emissions, produced when they
drain peatlands or cut down natural rainforests, Cortesi said.
At the same time, Cortesi said, APP is hiding behind a new set of
marketing channels by creating or buying smaller companies that sell APP
papers under different brands touted as "environmentally friendly." One
such example is Eagle Ridge Paper. In February, 10 environmental groups
in North America - including the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, the Natural
Resources Defense Council, and the Rainforest Action Network - issued a
statement saying that Eagle Ridge was a new "marketing and distribution"
arm for APP and urging major buyers, such as Staples, not to sell Eagle
Ridge paper products.
But the logging industry is not alone. The palm oil industry is
legendary for its greenwashing efforts. For all the virtues of palm oil
as the world's highest-yielding source of vegetable oil, expansion over
the past 25 years has consumed vast tracts of forest across Indonesia
and Malaysia.
But instead of acknowledging this and addressing concerns head-on,
marketing bodies for the industry have tended to expend efforts on
denial and greenwashing. The integrated market campaign includes Web
sites, blogs, think tanks, editorials, and advertisements.
One industry video used iguanas and hummingbirds - species found nowhere
near Malaysia - to suggest that biodiversity thrives in palm oil
plantations, despite a large body of scientific studies showing that oil
palm estates are biologically impoverished compared even with heavily
logged forests. Yusof Basiron, CEO of the Malaysian Palm Oil Council -
the government-backed marketing arm of the Malaysian palm oil industry -
has gone so far as to claim that endangered orangutans benefit from
living in proximity to oil palm plantations. Environmentalists scoff at
the notion, maintaining that oil palm expansion is one of the greatest
threats to orangutans.
These efforts illustrate the extent to which some companies will work to
mislead consumers. However, some industry executives realize it will
take more than deception to alleviate environmental concerns, and are
working to improve environmental performance through certification
programs that set standards for production and distribution.
These are dependent, however, on consumer preference for "greener"
products. In some markets - notably India and China, but even, in some
cases, in the United States and Europe - there is little willingness
among consumers to pay a premium for eco-friendly goods. So while some
palm oil producers have thrown their weight behind a certification
program devised by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), demand
for certified sustainable palm oil has been slow to materialize. In the
end, consumer apathy could prove to be the biggest threat to greening
the supply chain, and activist groups may increasingly find themselves
having to call attention to environmentally friendly companies.
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