A devastating report about the destruction of tropical forests by multi-national companies has been suppressed for three years by the European commission and World Wide Fund for Nature. The report names companies prepared to bribe and bully their way to lucrative logging concessions. It also blames the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank for inducing countries to sell their forests for a quick cash return to pay off debts to western countries.

The European commission, which paid the researchers nearly £200,000 for the work, was fearful of the repercussions if they named names and asked for a second version with names taken out - but even this version was watered down.

A third version still makes clear that EU funds being poured into developing countries to ensure forests are carefully managed are frequently wasted. Forest laws were enacted but no action taken.

The well respected authors from the World Resources Institute and the WWF said they were so disturbed by what they found that they recommended a moratorium on all further logging in eleven countries - Cameroon, Gabon, Congo-Brazzaville, the Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, and the Democratic Republic of Congo in central Africa; Belize, Surinam and Guyana in the Caribbean rim. This should last until bribery scandals had been investigated and proper environmental standards enforced, they said.

They also recommended an end to EU aid until these issues were addressed, but no action has been taken. The report says, "The new investments [by Asian multinational companies] have been concentrated in countries with generally weak or outdated environmental and social laws and little enforcement capacity. The governments of these countries are easy picking to foreign investors as they have weak forest services, poor monitoring capacity, inefficient tax collection and auditing capacity, and in some cases widespread bribery and corruption.

"Many of the countries are suffering severe economic difficulties with large foreign debts, high inflation and unemployment. In the majority of countries studied, decision making is controlled by a small group of powerful people or clans within the government that look at primary forests of their country as a short term source of personal revenue, not as a productive ecosystem which can generate social, economic and ecological benefits on the long term for the entire country and its people."

Violent clashes

The Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Cameroon and Belize were all named as suffering large-scale corruption."In some countries administrative procedures facilitate widespread corruption. Senior officials in countries such as Papua New Guinea have been shown to be taking decisions to award logging rights in exchange for bribes."

The report says although European companies have in the past indulged in bad practices the scale of the new incursions was much larger. "The logging itself is often very careless, with high collateral damage to the surrounding forest. The roads built to extract the timber often hundreds of kilometres long create access to frontier areas that facilitate the entry of commercial hunts, farmers, miners and others who cause further environmental damage." The companies frequently end up in violent clashes with local people and native tribes.

It blames the main donors to these countries - the World Bank, Japan, the EU, France, Germany, Britain and the US - for failing to enforce their own rules to promote forest conservation and responsible management. In fact the World Bank and IMF make things worse by imposing monetary reform on the countries, the report says. These countries are urged to allow in multinational companies and governments are urged to sell their forests for cash to pay back debts.

The report says if substantial action is not taken soon by governments, donor agencies and investors, as well as environmental and social pressure groups, much of the remaining virgin primary forests in the Caribbean rim, Central Africa and Pacific will be lost within 5 to 10 years, due to the expansion of unsustainable logging operations.

The original report was completed in 1997 and the EU cleared a twice-revised version for publication, printing 5,000 copies. Its press launch in July last year was blocked by the WWF, some of whose employees had carried out the research. The organisation feared that some of the governments concerned, particularly Malaysia, would close down WWF offices.

A weaker version of the report has now been prepared and, because the European commission refused to foot the bill, the WWF pulped the original 5,000 copies and has paid to print 2,000 of the latest version. The organisation said in a statement to the Guardian that it had to correct some "inaccuracies" and hoped this new version would be published in July.

The Guardian has seen the first three versions of the report - including the original draft that lists the names of companies and individuals involved in bribery scandals. The main authors of the report are Nigel Sizer, an expert for the World Resources Institute in Washington, and Donimiek Plouvier, a forestry consultant who works for WWF in Belgium. All their work was peer-reviewed in the countries concerned and by other forestry experts before being submitted.

Mr. Sizer said, "Of course I was deeply disappointed that the report was not published. A few things were corrected in the peer-review process. We were very careful about the conclusions we drew in the report. The commission was concerned and asked some of the names to be removed but I stand by everything that appeared in the drafts. My reputation and that of the institute depends on getting things right. Lack of accuracy was not the reason the report was withheld."

Crisis

A commission spokesman said, "We asked originally for some of the names to be removed and for some revisions but were satisfied with the later versions of the report. It was WWF that intervened to prevent publication last year. The new version of the report has now been delivered by them and will be distributed to interested parties when a list had been drawn up." Officials of the commission would now consider the report's findings.

WWF's senior officer, Jean-Paul Jeanrenaud, said WWF had been anxious to name names but was concerned that many of the companies were Asian and the organisation did not want to appear to be Asian-bashing. After the Asian financial crisis the report was held up for updating.

At risk - Who faces the axe

Papua New Guinea

If the forests were sustainably managed and harvested, it is estimated that the annual income to the country could be as much as £2bn. However massive corruption in the issue of timber permits, failure to monitor exports, and low royalties and taxes have reduced government returns. Environmental and social impacts have been serious and well documented.

Solomon Islands

In the original report there were allegations that seven government ministers were paid bribes by Malaysian logging companies. Evidence of conflicts between logging companies and local landowners. Landowners burned company bulldozers and a community leader was murdered. The later report said that under existing licences, 3m cubic metres of logs can be harvested annuall, which is eight times the sustainable harvest.

Central Africa and the Congo basin

The opening of access roads to logging has led to an influx of people, leading to deforestation. It has led to an enormous increase in commercial hunting and the bushmeat trade, which is threatening several species of large mammals. Asian countries, including China, are buying logs in increasing numbers from the countries involved - Congo-Brazzaville, Cameroon, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Central African Republic and Congo.

Cameroon

A large Malaysian firm came to Cameroon in mid-1995. By the end of 1995, shipments included several species of trees and smaller diameter logs for tests in the Asian market, especially Taiwan. It has secured licences to cut timber in a 100,000 hectare operation in the Korop national park where European donors have invested millions in protection. The workers are prohibited from hunting, but in practice do so daily.

Surinam

Granting of logging rights on public lands to specific companies in exchange for kickbacks, board membership for family members, shares in the company or financing of political campaigns. This can involve enormous areas of forest as in the recent case of Surinam where more than 3m hectares was set to be allocated in secret to three Asian logging companies and only halted after exposure and widespread public condemnation.

Belize

Seventeen logging concessions, totalling more than half a million acres, have been granted by the ministry of natural resources. Many of the concessions are in the Columbia river forest reserve, protected since 1953. Areas almost completely overlap Mayan Indian villages and threaten to deprive these groups of their livelihood.