It wants him to also break up these licences into smaller areas and gradually award concessions through open tender for the purpose of downstream timber industry activities.
It wants a total prohibition on timber logs to encourage the downstream timber industry and thereby create more jobs.
Sarawak DAP Chairman Chong Chieng Jen urged Adenan not to lose sight of the main issue in the timber industry — the monopoly by the Big Six, Ta Ann Group of Companies 1,069,935 acres; RH Group of Companies 2,475,604 acres; Shin Yang Group of Companies 1,237,716 acres; Samling Group of Companies 3,183,565 acres; KTS Group of Companies 357,017 acres; and WTK Group of Companies 882,176 acres.
Together, said Chong, the total number of timber concessions covered a third of Sarawak.
“The main enemy of Sarawak’s timber industry is not illegal logging but the monopolisation of the logging industry by the Big Six.
“If we compare Sarawak’s total official timber production and the illegal logs seized over the past years, it can be noted that the seized logs constitute less than 1% of the total timber production.”
It is obvious, added Chong, who is also Bandar Kuching MP and Kota Sentosa assemblyman, that illegal logging was not such a major problem in the logging industry to warrant the full weight of the government to combat it.
“This may be the reason why, after the freezing of more than 500 bank accounts of those timber-related companies last year, not a single company was prosecuted in court.”
Sarawak DAP, Chong hastened to add, does not condone illegal logging and agrees that stern action should be taken against the menace but expects, more importantly and urgently, that the government would break up the monopoly of the timber industry by the Big Six.
“This is a legacy of the previous Taib administration.
“Adenan should break this monopoly.”
The concentration of the timber resources in the Big Six, warned Chong, was detrimental to the state’s overall economy.
“It has deprived many of fair economic opportunities, widened income disparity, caused great outflow of money and resulted in the high deforestation rate in the state.”