MTC: Aussie timber law must be fair to all producers

SYDNEY: Malaysia wants Australia to treat all tropical timber producing countries fairly and not single them out as a supplier of illegal timber.

The Australian Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry announced a draft to the Australian parliament on the Illegal Logging Prohibition Bill, 2011 to stem the imports of illegally felled timber.

The bill is currently being studied and referred by its Minister Joe Ludwig, to a Senate Standing Committee on Rural Affairs and Transport.

The committee is under the Australian parliament, which is in recess right now and due to reconvene in December.

Malaysian Timber Council (MTC) chief executive Cheah Kam Huan said Malaysia is against illegally-produced timber but right now, the bill is very vague and may discriminate against tropical timber producing countries like Malaysia.

"The bill must be fair because illegal timber can also be found in temperate countries such as in Europe and South America," Cheah told Business Times.

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Dompok is leading a working visit to promote palm oil, timber and rubber to Australia, which ends on August 3.

"We are keen to obtain further clarifications on this legislation and discuss with our Australain partners especially in regard to the possible impact and the implications that this could have on the exisitng trade in timber products between the two countries," said Cheah.

He added that the MTC is following this legislative development closely as Australia is an important market for Malaysian timber products such as wooden furniture, builders, carpentry and joinery, mouldings, sawn timber and plywood, which amounted to A$258.1 million (RM841.63 million) in 2010 - From Zaidi Isham Ismail