The Forest Department under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation has been planning to permit the export of logs harvested from private timber plantations, U Tin Tun, director of the Forest Department, told The Myanmar Times.
To protect the environment and prevent deforestation, Myanmar in April 2014 banned the export of whole logs and raw timber, leading to a substantial decline in export revenues over the past few years.
In July this year, the government proposed allowing the export of logs grown by private investors such as sawmills. “Our aim is to attract investments in private timber plantations. Allowing exports is one way to incentivise investors in this segment,” said U Tin Tun.
The Forest Department has already submitted its plan to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation and is now awaiting approval from the relevant authorities to legalise private log exports.
Myanmar, private forest areas consist of teak, hardwood and industrial crop plantations. Some 300 private timber plantations have been allowed to harvest timber over 250,000 acres of private forest. Over 140,000 acres had been developed as at March this year, according to the Forest Department.
Before 2015, Myanmar allowed local businesses to develop commercial timber plantations on 500 acre of private forest lands for teakwood plantations, 200 acres for industrial plantations and 100 acres for hardwood plantation.
Since then, the Forest Department has permitted larger scale plantations of over 1000 acres to be developed on private forest land by both local and foreign investors. Land is awarded to private plantations via an open tender process.
So far, there have been a total of six local and foreign investments in large-scale plantations.
According to the Myanmar Investment Commission, foreign investors such as sawmills are required to produce and grow their own supply of timber. Approvals for such investments are to be obtained from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation.
SOURCE: MYANMAR TIMES
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