Suriname, the most densely forested country in
the world, has attracted the interest of huge Southeast
Asian logging companies. The country’s lax forestry
regulations put the rainforest-and the indigenous
groups that live in it-at extreme risk.
Flying low outside Sibu, an
old logging town on the is-
land of Borneo near the
Philippines, the devastation of the
once lush rainforests is unmistak-
able. Hundreds of logging roads
stretch like dirt-brown capillaries
through the forests as far as the eye
can see, and only “dead zones” re-
main in areas where giant stands of
timber have been extracted. Sibu
sits at the mouth of the Rajang
River, an immense watershed
whose waters are choked with thou-
sands of logs floated down from
lumber camps deep in the interior.
The tributaries which feed the
Rajang River are contaminated by
soil erosion, and are slick with the
glow of diesel oil which seeps from
the bulldozers of nearby logging
camps. Fish and other wildlife have
been wiped out by the uncontrolled
logging, threatening the livelihood
of local indigenous groups that
have made the rainforest their home
for centuries.
As logging supplies in Southeast
Asia dry up and governments in the
region impose harsher regulations
and even log-export bans, Southeast
Asian logging companies have been
forced to seek out new sources of
fresh timber. Suriname, the most
densely forested country in the
world, has become their latest ob-
ject of desire. The companies have
asked Suriname’s government to
grant a total of nearly 12 million
acres in timber concessions–a
third of the country’s total land area.
Suriname’s impoverished gov-
ernment is mulling over the foreign
logging proposals. Because the
concessions are so large, they have
been submitted to the country’s 51-
member parliament for approval.
Suriname’s dilemma stems from
the fact that as a small nation with
huge economic problems, the log-
ging proposals seem to be an ap-
Doug Tsuruoka is New York bureau chief
of Asia Times, a newspaper based in
Bangkok, Thailand.
The livelihoods of the 45,000 Maroons who inhabit Suriname’s rainforest are threat-
ened by Southeast Asian loggers.
pealing and quick way to bring in
much-needed foreign investment.
The Southeast Asian timber pro-
jects-with a total investment
value of over $300 million-would
provide ready cash for Suriname’s
hard-pressed economy. The risks,
however, to the country’s vast rain-
forests and the human settlements
that they support are great.
Suriname, a country about the
size of Nicaragua with a population
of 400,000, gained its independence
from the Netherlands 20 years ago.
Democratic rule was established in
1992 after nearly two decades of
chaos and military coups. Three
years ago, dissident Maroons ended
an armed insurrection against the
government under a peace treaty
brokered by the Organization of
American States (OAS).
The local economy is marked by
corruption, a thriving black market,
high unemployment, and chronic
shortages of foreign currency.
Inflation in 1994 was estimated at
642%. The country’s historic obses-
sion with resource-driven develop-
ment has discouraged capital for-
mation and the rise of value-added
industries such as manufacturing.
Suriname-the former Dutch
Guiana-is heavily dependent on
raw-material exports-bauxite, for
example, accounts for 70% of the
country’s export earnings. As those
bauxite deposits become depleted,
the most obvious natural resource
for Suriname to tap is its huge
Amazonian rainforests which blan-
ket 80% of the national territory.
Malaysian and Indonesian log-
gers have formed three separate
joint ventures in Suriname: Berjaya
Timber Industries Suriname N.V.,
headed by Malaysian gambling ty-
coon Vincent Tan Chee Yioun; N.V.
MUSA Indo-Suriname, a private
Indonesian logging concern; and
the Indonesian Suri-Atlantic. While
the loggers from Southeast Asia are
clearly the dominant players, a
dozen other foreign firms-includ-
ing two from South Korea and two
from China-have also recently in-
dicated interest in or formally ap-
plied for timber concessions in
Suriname.
The government is offering gen-
erous contract terms to the foreign
loggers. The concessions run for
25 years, and are renewable for an-
other 25. Tax breaks will result in
aggregate annual savings of $26
million over the life of the con-
tracts. If approved, the new log-
ging sites would total about 143%
more in area than the country’s ex-
isting 150 forestry concessions.
The concessions would also swell
Suriname’s total round-log pro-
duction by 15 to 20 times and mul-
tiply timber exports by 300 to 350
times.
The groundwork for the
Southeast Asian loggers’ foray into
South America was laid in 1993
when Suriname and Indonesia ex-
changed investment and economic
missions. These visits were under-
pinned by Indonesia and Suri-
name’s historic links as former
Dutch colonies. In addition, given
Suriname’s sizeable Indonesian,
Indian and Chinese communities,
forging business links with the
mostly Indonesian and ethnic-
Chinese loggers from Southeast
Asia was relatively easy.
Suriname isn’t the only location
being eyed by Malaysian and
Indonesian loggers. They are also
applying for 3 million acres in new
forestry concessions offered by the
Venezuelan government, and bid-
ding for another $100 million in
timber rights in neighboring
Guyana.
he reason for Southeast
Asian interest in South
America’s northern rim is
simple: the timber supply is abun-
dant and relatively unexploited, and
the cost cheap. Suriname abounds
in choice hardwoods known locally
as “Purple Heart” and “Green
Heart,” as well as several types of
mahogany. Taxes on timber exports
from Suriname are very low,
amounting to just 5% of base value
plus transportation costs-less than
half the current world rate. The
Southeast Asian firms would also
pay only about three dollars per
acre annually for concession rights,
whereas comparable concessions in
the U.S. Pacific Northwest, for in-
stance, would be ten times higher.
All these factors would allow the
Southeast Asian companies to
amass vast windfall profits.
Most of the timber shipped from
the new concessions would be des-
tined for major wood-consuming
markets like Japan, Taiwan, South
Korea and China, where demand
for raw timber and plywood is high.
Supplying these markets has be-
come difficult in recent years both
because of shrinking forest reserves
in the Asia-Pacific region and new
government logging regulations
that have been adopted or are being
considered in such prime logging
countries as Malaysia, Indonesia,
Papua New Guinea and the
Solomon Islands.
“It is billion-dollar logging com-
panies from Indonesia and
Malaysia which have contributed to
the exhaustion of timber stocks in
VOL XXIX, No 3 Nov/DEC 1995 7UPDATE / SURINAME
A tree stump in Suriname. Uncontrolled tree-cutting would endanger the rainforest’s
rich biodiversity.
Asia,” says Dr. Nigel Sizer, author
of “Backs to the Wall in Suriname,”
a World Resources Institute (WRI)
report published this April on the
dangers of growing Southeast
Asian timber interests in Suriname.
“They now seem to be looking to
the pristine rainforests of South
America to maintain their supplies
and market share, and to diversify
their investments with their tremen-
dous capital base.”
Suriname is also an attractive
place for Southeast Asian timber
barons to pursue their logging ac-
tivities because of relatively lax
forestry regulations. In Malaysia,
fines and jail terms for illegal log-
gers were increased in late 1992,
while in Indonesia forestry officials
have revoked concession permits
for a number of loggers. In
Suriname, by comparison, the im-
poverished Forestry Service–
presently made up of two profes-
sionals, one four-wheel drive vehi-
cle, and two outboard-driven ca-
noes-cannot adequately police the
almost 60,000 square miles of
forests.
The Southeast Asian timber com-
panies are notorious for their dev-
astating logging methods, which
routinely involve wiping out whole
sections of forest with little regard
for official rules governing mini-
mum tree-girth, species selection,
or phased cutting techniques that
would allow new trees to grow.
This logging method causes irre-
versible damage to water and natur-
al-food supplies by destroying the
tree-cover on which local ecosys-
tems depend.
In Southeast Asia, logging’s in-
vasion of remote jungle hinter-
lands has undermined indigenous
cultures by disrupting native agri-
culture and introducing a cash
economy. In Sarawak, Malaysia,
violent clashes have erupted be-
tween loggers and the Penan in-
digenous group, who have been
protesting the destruction of their
food and water supplies. Environ-
mentalists and human rights advo-
cates fear that these same loggers
will wreak similar havoc in
Suriname if their massive conces-
sions are approved.
For one thing, the concessions
will land on top of tens of thou-
sands of small farmers and indige-
nous peoples including Caribs and
Maroons. The country’s 45,000
Maroons-descendents of eigh-
teenth-century rebel slaves-are
subsistence farmers who have had
little contact with the country’s
more cosmopolitan coast. Five
other indigenous groups who rely
heavily on hunting and gathering
also live in the general area of the
concessions. “The impact would be
disastrous,” says E. Stanley Rensche
of the non-governmental human
rights organization Moiwana 86,
based in Paramaribo. “If you look
at the map, the living conditions of
the indigenous and tribal people
will be tremendously disrupted.”
The concessions will likely
undermine indigenous land rights
since legal ownership of cultivated
land is not well-established by the
courts. This, in turn, could trigger
severe conflicts. “The Maroons do
not have statutory title to their
land,” says Gary Brana-Shute, a
George Washington University an-
thropologist who has carried out re-
search in Suriname over the past
two decades. “Increasingly, it will
become clear that their patrimony
is being cut down and carried
away.”
The arrival of the big logging
companies is also sure to increase
contact with what Brana-Shute
calls “the Sodom and Gomorrah of
coastal populations.”
“Consumerism has already start-
ed in Maroon society,” says Brana-
Shute. “It is rending their religion.
The council of elders no longer has
sway over the young, and people no
longer exchange services.”
Uncontrolled tree-felling in
Suriname would endanger native
flora and fauna as well. The coun-
try’s rainforests are home to 674
species of birds, 200 mammal
species, 130 reptile species, and
4,500 species of plants. These
forests are not only important regu-
lators of the earth’s climate, but also
reservoirs of genetic material which
are critical to medical science. In his
1990 book, Rainforest Politics,
Ecological Destruction in South-
east Asia, Philip Hurst estimates
that 40% of all prescribed drugs in
the United States are based on for-
8 NACLA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS
0
0
C
NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 8UPDATE / SURINAME
mulas found in rainforest plants.
Evidence is also growing that such
jungle areas will yield important
weapons in the the fight against
AIDS and other diseases.
After a feverish campaign by
environmentalists and hu-
man rights activists this
spring, Surinamese politicians tem-
porarily placed the Malaysian and
Indonesian logging concessions on
hold, pending a review of more su-
tainable development plans. Some
officials, leery of the Southeast
Asian bids, welcomed the WRI re-
port, which was distributed to
Suriname’s parliament. “It is very
important for us to make a good en-
vironmental study,” says Franco
Demon, Suriname’s minister of nat-
ural resources, “because we don’t
want to destroy our forests-we
want to use them in a sustainable
way.”
Enrique Iglesias, president of the
Inter-American Development Bank
(IDB), is heading an effort to delay
the signing of new forestry conces-
sions for at least three years. In re-
turn, Iglesias promises to inject
about $5 million annually into
Suriname’s ailing economy. The
cash would be used to train forestry
officers, help build the country’s
social institutions, and develop
commercial alternatives to logging
such as eco-tourism.
The Southeast Asian loggers,
however, enjoy the backing of pow-
erful ruling circles in Suriname.
Allegations of bribery and other
shady dealings are rampant, and
many observers fear the conces-
sions will win parliamentary ap-
proval by year’s end.
Some Southeast Asian timber
companies have in fact already
been accused of improprieties
while operating in Suriname.
Indonesian-owned MUSA, which
currently manages a 300,000-acre
concession, has been criticized in
the Surinamese press for negotiat-
ing contracts on the side with local
community leaders to buy timber
from communal lands at very low
prices. Suriname’s parliament has
created a special commission to
look into the charges against
MUSA.
Nigel Sizer, the author of the
WRI report, considers the IDB pro-
posal of international assistance the
most environmentally sound option
for Suriname. “Instead of opening
up enormous new concessions to
foreign investors,” he says,
“Suriname could use international
assistance to avoid trading in its
forest assets for quick cash and last-
ing disaster.” That aid could be
used to build up Suriname’s 150 ex-
isting forestry concessions, which
are owned by local businessmen
and have the advantage of being
closer to coastal timber centers.
This would obviate the extensive
and environmentally damaging
roadwork in the interior which
would be necessary if the Southeast
Asian concessions were approved.
The international assistance could
also be mobilized to overhaul the
way that Suriname administers and
enforces its forestry laws and to in-
stitute farming-assistance programs
for isolated communities like the
Maroons.
For now, the Surinamese govern-
ment is sorely tempted by the
siren’s song of the Southeast Asian
loggers. While their offers may
sound appealing as a way to boost
the country’s sagging economy, they inevitably auger social and
ecological disaster.
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