BOGOTÁ — Logs float downstream in long lines on the murky waters of the Atrato River in the depths of the Pacific rainforests of Colombia’s Chocó department. With few roads, this region in northwest Colombia relies on waterways for transportation, though some are blocked by remnants of the logging industry. Towering trees and thick undergrowth line the river, but sections of the banks are stripped bare, exposing the earth. A new investigation by the U.S.-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) reveals that most wood for flooring and decking from Colombia’s Pacific and Amazon forests, including the protected Dipteryx odorata (cumarú or choibá tree), is exported illegally. EIA’s “Decking the Forest” report exposes a long trail of irregularities across national wood companies, illegal armed groups, and companies in the U.S., the European Union, Canada and elsewhere. The report suggests that local Afro-Colombian and Indigenous communities are exploited, threatened, and left with few alternatives as their lands deteriorate under pressure from the illegal timber trade. The EIA estimates that $24 million worth of processed timber exports between 2020 and 2023, including flooring and decking, lacked the required legal certification, citing export data from Colombian customs authorities and responses from local environmental authorities. This suggests that about 94% of such wood exports from Colombia during that period were illegal. About 20% of these exports were destined for the U.S., Canada and the EU. The report suggests that wood companies were allegedly forced to make payments to illegal armed groups in Chocó and Antioquia departments…

This article was originally published on Mongabay