what is the company lawyer in a rainforest tree

Is unsustainable logging of tropical rainforests still legal?

In 1996, Asian companies invested more than US$ 500 million in Brazil’s timber industry, mainly because they were keenly aware of the speed at which the forests in Asia are being cut 1. However, controlling the legality and impact of such operations within the Amazon rainforest is tricky at best, considering the number of extractive operations and their remoteness.

Who is the CEO of Rainforest Alliance?

Panama Government Permits Rainforest Destruction, in Abrupt Reversal. A Panamanian governmental agency annulled the land claim of Aruza, an indigenous Wounaan village sitting on 31 square miles of primary rainforest in the Darien Gap. With the support of Rainforest Foundation US, Aruza is legally challenging the decision. Article.

Who is Rainforest Cafe owned by?

Rainforest Alliance Certification Platform in order to: • Apply for approval to use Rainforest Alliance trademarks and make public certified claims by selecting ‘Other’ and then ‘I only want to submit trademark requests on behalf of my company’ when creating your account. You do not need a certificate or traceability account.

Do indigenous people have legal rights to tropical forests?

Jul 27, 2012 · RAINFOREST LOGGING. Logging is one of the most prominent and best-known forms of rainforest degradation and destruction. Despite improved logging techniques and greater international awareness and concern for the rainforests, unsustainable logging of tropical rainforests continues— much of it practiced illegally by criminal syndicates .

Why are forest concessions short?

Because the terms for forest concessions are short, companies have few incentives to replant trees or harvest efficiently. The strategy is to obtain as much profit as possible in the available timeframe, leaving many damaged areas that will take years to recover. 3.

How long did logging last in the Amazon?

In Tapajós National Forest in the Brazilian Amazon, a study in terra firma rainforest (forested area not affected by seasonal flooding) that had been logged and left as such in 1979 showed that logging stimulated growth, but this effect was short lived, lasting only about 3 years.

Is forest clearing illegal in Colombia?

In Colombia, while illegal practices have been reduced, government assessments reveal that between 80% and 90% of all forest clearing is still illegal, with timber being smuggled into Brazil and Peru.

Is logging illegal in Brazil?

While laws exist which authorize logging in designated areas, illegal logging is widespread in Brazil and several Amazon countries. A study by a Brazilian commission showed that 80% of all logging in the Amazon was illegal during the late 90s 2. Of the 13 companies that were investigated, 12 had broken the law.

1. Emergent Layer

The emergent layer is the top layer of the rainforest. It is over 45m (150 ft.) from the ground, and in some areas, trees can reach a height of over 70m (230 ft.)

2. Canopy Layer

The canopy layer is the second-highest layer of the rainforest. It is filled with leaves and branches from the trees in this layer of the rainforest. The canopy layer is between 30 and 45 meters (100 to 150 feet) tall from the ground. The majority of animals and plants live in the second layer of the rainforest.

3. Understory Layer

Generally speaking, you can think of the rainforest’s third layer as the middle man between the canopy and the forest floor. In the understory, you will see leafy bushes, saplings (young trees), and vines.

4. Forest Floor Layer

The forest floor only receives 2% of the sunlight, making it dark, damp, and hot. Also, the rainforest soil isn’t rich in nutrients, making rainforest trees’ roots spread out over a wide area.

Rights

We support indigenous leaders to secure and assert their rights at local, national and international levels and foster networks, alliances, and platforms that strengthen their voice.

Lands

We partner with indigenous communities to obtain legal rights to customary lands and to protect them from deforestation through technical training, legal and negotiation support, and advocacy.

Leadership

We work with indigneous peoples’ organizations, NGOs and leaders to build the institutions, governance structures and technical skills to advance their policy and development objectives.

News from the Ground

Gender inclusion is key to effective and sustainable forest protection, yet many indigenous women have been traditionally excluded from participation. We highlight the work of women who are leaders in our Rainforest Alert program.

What is a raforest logging?

RAINFOREST LOGGING. Logging is one of the most prominent and best-known forms of rainforest degradation and destruction. Despite improved logging techniques and greater international awareness and concern for the rainforests, unsustainable logging of tropical rainforests continues— much of it practiced illegally by criminal syndicates .

How much did WEMPCO pay for mahogany trees?

In Nigeria, which suffered the highest rate of primary forest loss (55.7 percent) in the first half of this decade, WEMPCO, a Hong Kong logging firm, in the 1990s reportedly paid US$28 to the government for each mahogany tree while reselling the wood at US$800 per cubic meter, roughly US$2,900 per tree.

How much money does illegal logging cost?

Developing countries often see only a fraction of the money generated legal logging operations, and even less from illegal logging, which, according to World Bank estimates, costs governments about US$5 billion in lost revenues annually and hits national economies for another US$10 billion per year.

What countries have banned domestic logging?

With a construction boom fueling demand for wood, China has been linked to logging in Africa, the Amazon, Burma, and Indonesia.

Where did Asian logging companies move their timber?

In the late 1990s, after depleting much of their own timber stocks, Asian logging companies began aggressively moving into rainforest areas including northeastern South America ( Guyana, Suriname); the Brazilian Amazon; the Congo Basin of Central Africa; the South Pacific, particularly the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea; and Central America.

How does thinning the canopy affect the forest?

The thinning of the protective canopy exposes the forest to increased sunlight and drying winds that can kill symbiotic soil organisms essential for decomposition and nutrient-fixing, while drying leaf litter and increasing the forest's vulnerability to fire.

Which countries banned raw logs?

Several countries, including Cambodia, the Solomon Islands, and Burma, in the 1990s banned raw log exports in an effort to increase revenue for local operators and the government, but raw logs are still commonly smuggled by crime syndicates in several countries. Industrial logging in Sumatra. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.

Why is Raintree important?

Since it's inception in 1995, Raintree has been the leader in creating a world market for the important medicinal plants of the Amazon Rainforest. Today, millions of acres of government owned, privately held, NGO controlled, and Indian demarcated lands in the Amazon are demonstrating that wild-harvesting medicinal plants on rainforest land provides greater income and profits to the land owner and country than any other unsustainable land usage. Medicinal plant harvesting programs competes successfully and directly with other interests in the rainforest like timber logging and results in higher profits for the land while still preserving its biodiversity instead of destroying it. This IS the economic incentive and encouragement necessary to protect the rainforest for future generations and it IS working to protect rainforest lands today.

What are the resources of the rainforest?

These include important medicinal plants used for centuries by rainforest inhabitants, nuts, fruits, oils, fibers, and other resources like chocolate, rubber and chicle.

Who is Leslie Taylor?

Since 1995, Leslie Taylor has been working with indigenous tribal healers and shamans as well as rainforest community herbal healers called curanderos and other natural health practitioners, herbalists and researchers in South American cities, to target potential plants which have important medicinal values and benefits. Worldwide document gathering and literature searches compile and compare what other ethnobotanists, botanists, and researchers have discovered and tested about the properties, uses, and effectiveness of the plants. All of this research information can be found freely accessible in the Tropical Plant Database. This extensive database represents 17 years of research on the important medicinal plants of the Amazon and is one of the most accessed online resources on the subject with tens of thousands of visitors monthly. When the FDA mandated that the Tropical Plant Database must be removed from the Raintree Nutrition, Inc. website, Ms. Taylor decided that her own personal profits gained from selling rainforest herbal supplements were far less important than keeping this factual indepth documentation freely accessible to all.

Is Raintree Nutrition a rainforest company?

Raintree Nutrition, Inc., has been involved in researching, developing, importing and marketing non-timber rainforest products with special emphasis on the important medicinal plants of the Amazon Rainforest. From 1996 to 2012, Raintree Nutrition, Inc. sold the rainforest herbal supplements shown here. These products and proprietary formulas were developed by Leslie Taylor, President and managing director of Raintree Nutrition, Inc.. Ms. Taylor has been a leader in the industry in educating people about these powerful medicinal plants of the Amazon and she has actually welcomed competition and encouraged other companies to sell them and use them in other supplement products. As more and more companies began sourcing rainforest plants for their products, more rainforest lands were utilized for these harvesting programs that competed with other unsustainable uses.#N#However, in 2012, Ms. Taylor decided to close down Raintree Nutrition, Inc. and to stop selling any rainforest herbal products. Regulations enforced by the FDA have progessively prohibited free speech about the value and benefits of herbal supplements, factual information about independently published clinical research, as well as what to take them for and how to use them. As long as Raintree Nutrition was selling herbal supplements, Ms. Taylor was limited and prohibited in what she could actually say about them. Ms. Taylor decided that the wealth of factual and truthful information about these important plants and formulas was more important than selling products and this factual information needed to stay widely available to continue to help people. Raintree Nutrition, Inc. officially closed and ceased selling products on December 21, 2012. Ms. Taylor then freely shared all of her proprietary formulas by posting them on Raintree website so that anyone and everyone can make them and use them. All of the factual research and documentation about these plants have been reinstated on these product pages (previously removed by FDA demand) and linked back to the extensive Tropical Plant Database for further information (also previously removed by FDA demand).

What percentage of Bolivia is landlocked?

And in no other country is the problem as serious as in landlocked and remote Bolivia. Though better known for its bleak and haunting highlands, 70 percent of Bolivia's land mass is part of the Amazon basin, from biodiverse foothills to lowland jungles.

What is the problem with Amazonia?

As a result, the 40 percent of Amazonia located in a moon-shaped arc of countries from Bolivia to Colombia to French Guiana faces a more serious threat than the jungle in Brazil. The culprits range from ranching to soybean farming, logging to infrastructure development projects.

What is Zotar's daughter learning about?

Still, Zotar says she is ever more conscious of the environment — in school, her daughter is learning about how destruction of the Amazon results in climate change, and that has affected Zotar, who points out a clump of trees on her family's land that she wants to preserve. "We've got to protect this," she says.

Which country has the highest deforestation rate?

Bolivia, which is vast but has barely 10 million inhabitants, has among the highest per capita deforestation rates in the world. "It's the highest in the Amazonian basin," says Eduardo Forno, director of Conservation International in La Paz, Bolivia 's capital. "We have to ask why.

What are the animals that live in Bolivia?

The country has more than 1,400 species of birds, from macaws to toucans to eagles that dart past trees in search of monkeys. There are jaguars, pink dolphins, wild pigs and a range of other mammals.

How many acres of land did Martha Zotar buy?

Martha Zotar, 37, and her family are making a living on land that was once virgin forest. They legally bought 170 acres and are now raising chickens and growing everything from rice to soybeans, the region's cash crop.

Who is the expert on Amazonian deforestation?

But Thomas Lovejoy, an expert on Amazonian deforestation at George Mason University, points out that it's Brazil's government and Brazilian companies that are funding development such as highway and hydroelectric dam construction in parts of the non-Brazilian Amazon.

Why was the Douglas fir tree arrested?

The 24-year-old was arrested while trying to protect what activists call the last undisturbed stand of old-growth Douglas fir trees in California. The Rainbow Ridge trees are part of a temperate rainforest that stores more carbon per square acre than the Amazon.

How many acres does Humboldt Redwood Company own?

Humboldt Redwood Company owns over 200,000 acres in Humboldt County and is certified sustainable through the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). That certification requires the company to prove that it abides by the council’s principles, which include boosting the long-term social and environmental benefits of forests, avoiding negative environmental impacts, and maintaining high conservation value areas. FSC standards also require that any area that has never been harvested be left intact.

How many acres of forest will be restored by 2030?

In March, the United Nations announced a goal to restore approximately 865 million acres of forest globally by 2030. One study made the case that tree planting can provide one-third of the climate mitigation needed to meet objectives set in the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.

Does Humboldt Redwood Company log old trees?

In two separate phone interviews, Humboldt Redwood Company director of forest policy John Anderson said the company does not log any old-growth trees.

Do activists agree that old growth forests should be preserved?

While both activists and Humboldt Redwood Company, the organization logging the land, agree that old-growth forest should be preserved – they don’t agree on a definition of old-growth forest. There’s no universally accepted definition. The way Olive tells it, she fell into the subject of old-growth forests by accident.

What is the mascot of Rainforest Cafe?

Rainforest Cafe also has a set of mascots, called "The Wild Bunch". These characters include Cha! Cha!, the red-eyed tree frog; Iggy, the green iguana; Nile, the Nile crocodile; Rio, the scarlet macaw; Maya, the jaguar; Tuki, the African forest elephant; Bamba, the eastern gorilla; and Ozzie, the Bornean orangutan.

When did Rainforest Cafe open?

The first international location opened in London, England in June 1997. In 1998, it was planned to build 12 additional restaurants in the United States, seven in Mexico, and five in the UK, for a total of 22 restaurants by 2008. In 2000, the Rainforest Cafe was bought by Landry's Restaurants Inc., a company specializing in dining, hospitality, ...