Through a Court Order, Toolsie Persaud Limited (TPL) yesterday blocked the Guyana Forestry Commis-sion (GFC) from enforcing a stop order on its Timber Sales Agreement (TSA) and from collecting a fine of over $80M for alleged breaches in harvesting regulations.
The GFC is to attend a hearing in the High Court on May 7, 2008, when the GFC will present its case and respond to TPL.
Speaking at a press conference at the Ministry of Agriculture Boardroom yesterday, Minister of Agri-culture Robert Persaud said in the latter part of 2007, an audit revealed that TPL was guilty of harvesting in at least 27 blocks for which no 100 per cent inventory information was submitted or approved by the GFC. Secondly the company was also in breach of the guidelines by harvesting in two blocks which were not stated in the Annual Operation Plan for 2007.
“The total volume that was harvested without approval was 24,153 m3 of logs and 28,719 metres of round wood (piles, poles, posts). Compensation payable to the GFC for these breaches was calculated at $80,289,100,” the Minister said.
He said that on the basis of the evidence, the GFC held several meetings with the management of TPL to address the issue. “At no time during these discussions did the company deny the occurrence of these breaches,” Persaud said.
He said that in February 2007, the GFC wrote the company directly advising again on the procedures to be followed before approval could be granted for the commencement of harvesting for 2007.
The Minister said that the GFC, after completing an exhaustive investigative process, which had included discussions with management of TPL formally wrote TPL advising them of the specific breaches committed and the compensation payable in accordance with the procedures for calculating compensatory payments.
“Subsequently the GFC via correspondence reminded TPL of the breaches and the need for this matter to be resolved urgently. The GFC then received correspondence dated March 18, 2008, from R.N. Poonai and S.J. Poonai, attorneys on behalf of TPL. That correspondence indicated clearly that TPL was disputing that it committed any breach. The GFC then held additional discussions with the management of TPL, but TPL maintained its position; as a result, the GFC issued a stop order for activities on the TSA,” the Minister said.
Yesterday, the GFC received notice of legal proceedings instituted by TPL against the GFC.
Toolsie Persaud Limited is the holder of a TSA that expired in December 2007. In the latter part of 2006, all holders of TSAs and Wood Cutting Leases (WCL) were reminded at a meeting held in the GFC’s Lower Conference Room of the procedures that were to be followed for their harvesting operations in 2007 to be approved by the GFC. “This was followed by a public notice further reminding TSA and WCL holders of the procedures and the consequences of non-compliance,” the Minister said.
According to the Minister, the AOP must contain the number of 100-hectare harvesting blocks to be harvested, accompanied with 100 per cent inventory information for all the commercial species to be harvested from these blocks. “Approval for harvesting is given after the GFC has conducted field checks to confirm the level of accuracy,” the Minister said.
“The GFC is very concerned that despite its best efforts of encouraging the sector to do sustainable forest management practices, TPL has committed blatant breaches and when so advised, they have chosen to take legal action. Of note, however, is the fact that other companies such as Barama Company Limited, Caribbean Resources Limited, Guyana Sawmills Limited, amongst others have agreed on settling the liabilities for similar breaches,” said the Minister.
Barama had been similarly sanctioned last year with two fines: the first being $96M and the second being about half of that. These fines were said to have been paid.
Present at the press conference was Commissioner of Forests James Singh. When asked how these breaches could have occurred when the GFC has staff deployed in the forests. Singh said that it is physically impossible for the forest monitoring staff to have a presence in all of the concessions to monitor closely those operations. He said that with this in mind, the GFC has beefed up its monitoring staff and will be doing more of that. But the Commissioner made the point that the onus is on the concessionaires to ensure that the regulations are followed in harvesting operations.
The Minister said that one way of dealing with this is through the use of satellite technology and for this the Government of Guyana is working with the International Tropical Timber Organisation (ITTO) and groups in Brazil, where the technology has been employed to monitor concessions.
