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Good flooring is about more than just looks
By Steve Maxwell
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Whenever you make home renovation choices, the effects of your purchases ripple out much farther than you’d imagine. In fact, some of the choices we make in Canadian home improvement stores reach all the way around the globe. And while this hasn’t always been the case, it certainly is now, especially when it comes to merbau, a wood species used for premium flooring.
Few homebuilding materials are as international in origin as hardwood flooring is today. Where our options used to be limited to domestic oak, birch and maple, tropical hardwood flooring is now available in ever widening and attractive varieties. And with this change in the marketplace comes an important new responsibility for us all as homeowners. Forestry practices in many tropical regions fall short of what’s considered legitimate here in Canada. Far short. That’s why you need to ask serious questions about the logging practices you’re indirectly supporting whenever you buy wood flooring. You have a responsibility here, and a wood species called merbau is an especially sensitive case in point.
Merbau is a gorgeous, medium-brown Asian wood that’s 50% harder than red oak. This is why it’s a precious resource, though supplies are dwindling. Only 5% of Asia’s original frontier forests remain today, and the largest stands of merbau trees are found in Indonesia. They’re supposed to be protected by legislation, but widespread corruption and bribery has allowed a massive illegal trade in merbau logs to emerge and flourish. As much as $600 million worth of merbau flooring each month is being manufactured in China from illegally cut and ‘laundered’ merbau logs smuggled from Indonesia. False paperwork and generous bribes ease passage of this wood into mills mostly centred in a place called Nanxun. China has been publicly recognized as the largest processor of stolen timber in the world, and Nanxun is the heart of where this wood is turned into flooring. A significant portion of this product ends up in Canadian home improvement outlets.
Over the last few years Indonesian merbau theft has been carefully documented through daring undercover missions completed by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) in partnership with the Indonesian group Telapak. The EIA is an independent, Washington-based organization that has been exposing environmental criminals since 1984. Their first merbau report was released in February 2005 and caused the Indonesian government to take the merbau issue seriously. At least for a while, anyway. Within a year, though, illegally harvested merbau was flowing again, much of it to Canadian retailers through a single, Quebec-based supplier.
As it stands now, sources of merbau are so clouded and murky that no one can be sure whether or not the flooring comes from an illegal source. You may get another story from flooring salespeople, but don’t believe them. The facts are clear, and merbau is not to be trusted, regardless of how beautiful it is. Check out the facts for yourself with the EIA’s latest report at www.eia-international.org.
Ultimately, our own economic choices as consumers fuels trade, both legitimate and illegal. That’s why you need to ask hard questions whenever you buy wood products, especially when it comes to the harvesting practices and environmental sustainability of tropical wood.
A good place to start is with the certification status of the wooden items you’re considering. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is a leading international organization that verifies the environmental sustainability of wood products from all around the world, including flooring. When you ask a retailer about the origin of new flooring for your home, don’t be satisfied with vague assurances that everything is all right environmentally. The truth could be very far from this indeed. Quantitative standards for assessing the sustainability of wood harvesting practices do exist and the best of them can be trusted. Don’t believe excuses to the contrary. And even if the store you’re visiting doesn’t stock certified wood products just yet, asking for them is the best way to make things change.
It’s never been a better time to improve your home. The products, services and ideas available to us today are terrific, but you have to be careful. After all, what’s the point in making your own home a terrific place to live if it costs some other part of the planet its heart and soul?
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Good flooring is about more than just looks
By Steve Maxwell
|
|
|
Whenever you make home renovation choices, the effects of your purchases ripple out much farther than you’d imagine. In fact, some of the choices we make in Canadian home improvement stores reach all the way around the globe. And while this hasn’t always been the case, it certainly is now, especially when it comes to merbau, a wood species used for premium flooring.
Few homebuilding materials are as international in origin as hardwood flooring is today. Where our options used to be limited to domestic oak, birch and maple, tropical hardwood flooring is now available in ever widening and attractive varieties. And with this change in the marketplace comes an important new responsibility for us all as homeowners. Forestry practices in many tropical regions fall short of what’s considered legitimate here in Canada. Far short. That’s why you need to ask serious questions about the logging practices you’re indirectly supporting whenever you buy wood flooring. You have a responsibility here, and a wood species called merbau is an especially sensitive case in point.
Merbau is a gorgeous, medium-brown Asian wood that’s 50% harder than red oak. This is why it’s a precious resource, though supplies are dwindling. Only 5% of Asia’s original frontier forests remain today, and the largest stands of merbau trees are found in Indonesia. They’re supposed to be protected by legislation, but widespread corruption and bribery has allowed a massive illegal trade in merbau logs to emerge and flourish. As much as $600 million worth of merbau flooring each month is being manufactured in China from illegally cut and ‘laundered’ merbau logs smuggled from Indonesia. False paperwork and generous bribes ease passage of this wood into mills mostly centred in a place called Nanxun. China has been publicly recognized as the largest processor of stolen timber in the world, and Nanxun is the heart of where this wood is turned into flooring. A significant portion of this product ends up in Canadian home improvement outlets.
Over the last few years Indonesian merbau theft has been carefully documented through daring undercover missions completed by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) in partnership with the Indonesian group Telapak. The EIA is an independent, Washington-based organization that has been exposing environmental criminals since 1984. Their first merbau report was released in February 2005 and caused the Indonesian government to take the merbau issue seriously. At least for a while, anyway. Within a year, though, illegally harvested merbau was flowing again, much of it to Canadian retailers through a single, Quebec-based supplier.
As it stands now, sources of merbau are so clouded and murky that no one can be sure whether or not the flooring comes from an illegal source. You may get another story from flooring salespeople, but don’t believe them. The facts are clear, and merbau is not to be trusted, regardless of how beautiful it is. Check out the facts for yourself with the EIA’s latest report at www.eia-international.org.
Ultimately, our own economic choices as consumers fuels trade, both legitimate and illegal. That’s why you need to ask hard questions whenever you buy wood products, especially when it comes to the harvesting practices and environmental sustainability of tropical wood.
A good place to start is with the certification status of the wooden items you’re considering. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is a leading international organization that verifies the environmental sustainability of wood products from all around the world, including flooring. When you ask a retailer about the origin of new flooring for your home, don’t be satisfied with vague assurances that everything is all right environmentally. The truth could be very far from this indeed. Quantitative standards for assessing the sustainability of wood harvesting practices do exist and the best of them can be trusted. Don’t believe excuses to the contrary. And even if the store you’re visiting doesn’t stock certified wood products just yet, asking for them is the best way to make things change.
It’s never been a better time to improve your home. The products, services and ideas available to us today are terrific, but you have to be careful. After all, what’s the point in making your own home a terrific place to live if it costs some other part of the planet its heart and soul? |
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