Blog: Forests

At 7.30am, on September 6th, almost 100 activists from Greenpeace's Forest Crime Unit halted construction at the National Lottery funded refurbishment of Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow, the most visited museum in the UK outside London.

The volunteers removed packs of timber, which is being used for new flooring, and replaced it with timber certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), guaranteed to be come from environmentally and socially responsible sources. At the same time, four Greenpeace climbers scaled the front of the museum before dropping a banner reading 'The National Lottery: Funding Rainforest Destruction'.

Responsibility lies with the major markets, such as the UK. The UK is the largest EU importer of Indonesian plywood.

UK companies peddle illegal goods Travis Perkins and Jewson both purchase large quantities of Indonesian plywood. They are trading in products they know come from illegal and destructive logging of rainforests.

Can you imagine what it would be like to have your home torn down around you and destroyed? It's a horrible thought, but that's exactly what is happening in forests around the world. With an area of forest the size of a football pitch being destroyed every two seconds, endangered species such as gorillas, orang utans and chimpanzees are at risk of extinction within our lifetimes.