Responding to Tony Blair's comment in Prime Ministers question time today that Greenpeace's statement about wood being used for the Cabinet Office refurbishment is 'misconceived', Greenpeace re-asserts that the timber procured for the Cabinet Office comes from the destruction of Africa's last rainforests and is not from any recognised certification scheme.
Greenpeace's evidence for these statements is as follows:
- No recognised certification schemes for wood exist in Cameroon - which the government admits using for the Cabinet Office windows and some of the doors. The UK Director of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) stated today that, "There is no FSC certified timber available from Cameroon at this time. Neither am I aware of any other independently certified timber under any other systems available from Cameroon."
- The Project Manager for the Cabinet Office refurbishment, Drivers Jonas, confirmed in a telephone call that the doors for this project do not have certificates.
- The government's own statement to Greenpeace shows their lack of understanding of the issues involved in sourcing certified timber. According to the Cabinet Office "Timbmet Ltd [the suppliers of much of the timber] is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council". This statement is inaccurate. Timbmet is not certified by the Forest Stewardship Council.
Timbmet does trade in a small volume of FSC timber - but none of the sapele timber used in this project comes from FSC certified sources. Timbnet buys timber (including sapele) from the following companies in this region - Vicwood Thanry, Rougier and SEFAC. All of these companies have recent convictions for illegal logging. Rougier is linked to the bushmeat trade - as recently documented by the BBC in 'Ape Hunters' - a film by Jeremy Bristow.
- In a statement issued today Balfour Beatty state " in order to ensure that they were being supplied with timber that meets the contract requirements an independent review of timber sourcing and certification has already been commissioned. ". If they are confident that all the timber for this project is from certified sustainable sources then why do they need to launch an independent review?
Further information:
Contact:
Greenpeace press office 020 7865 8255
