With the approval of the Provincial Party Committee and People's Committee of Nghe An province, last weekend, the People's Committee of Que Phong district, the Management Board of Pu Hoat Nature Reserve, Thong Thu Border Guard Station and Nghe An Newspaper made a working trip to exchange information and grasp the situation of exploitation, transportation, business and processing of forest products and farming in the Laos - Vietnam border area in Xam Tay and Muong Quan districts, Hua Phan province, Laos.
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| During the trip, the working delegation and the authorities of Xam Tay district organized a field trip to patrol the border to closely grasp the situation. |
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| While passing through a livestock area of the Mong people in Nam Tay village, the working group discovered illegal timber. In the photo: Illegal timber is gathered at the end of the livestock area. |
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| The cattle ranch is located right on the border patrol road but has a fence and an iron gate that is always closed; besides, there is a man on duty to open and close the gate. |
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| Lifting the tarpaulins, the wooden planks showed no signs of legality. The working group officers confirmed that this was illegal wood, including Po mu and Sa mu dau, belonging to the group of rare and precious trees that are strictly protected and prohibited from exploitation and business. |
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| This illegal timber has been processed into large slabs about 3m long, 1m to 1.6m wide, and about 20-30cm thick. In the photo: The forest ranger of Xam Tay district, Mr. May La - Deputy Head of the Agriculture Department, inspects and appraises the wood. |
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The pile of Sa mu oil wood has large slabs up to approximately 1m3. According to Pu Hoat Nature Reserve officials and Que Phong District Forest Rangers, Sa mu dau and Po mu are two types of timber that currently have very high economic value. It is estimated that the amount of Sa mu dau and Po mu timber illegally gathered here is up to about 20m3, if successfully transported to Vietnam, it will be worth billions of dong. |
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According to Mr. Xam La, this amount of wood was transported from Muong Quan district, through the Lao border patrol route. This amount of wood was illegally exploited and purchased by Vietnamese brokers in collusion with Lao subjects. The livestock farming area is just where the group of subjects gathered illegal wood. These subjects gathered wood here and waited for a convenient time to transport it back to Vietnam for consumption. After the inspection, Mr. Xam La informed the working group: "I have reported to the Chairman of Xam Tay district to have the authorities come to seize all the evidence of illegal wood, then focus on investigating and clarifying the related subjects...". |
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| On the map, the Vietnam border forest and the Laos border forest have very big differences. Therefore, the Vietnam border forest has been the target of illegal exploitation and trafficking for many years. |
