The Laundering MachIne; How Fraud and Corruption In Peru’s Concession System are Destroying the Future of its Forests

exporters in Peru and importers in the United states and around the world are currently integral parts of a systematic flow of illegal timber from the Peruvian Amazon. sometimes intentionally, sometimes through sheer negligence, each of the actors and agencies involved in this system are working as gears in a well-oiled machine that is ransacking Peru’s forests and undermining the livelihoods and rights of the people that depend on them.In this report EIA documents for the first time the systematic export and import of illegal wood from Peru to the Us. In many ways this report not a new story: the system’s corruption is something of which everyone in the sector is aware.  eIA’s contribution lies in having identified and patiently put together the pieces of the puzzle to reveal the mechanism that allows this trade to happen: what we call here the “laundering machine”.there are, of course, individuals and organizations in this sector who are trying to work legally; but corruption and illegality remain the norm, not the exception. Officials or offices attempting to do things right often have their hands tied by lack of resources both fiscal and physical.   And those who attempt to change the system are summarily dismissed or even threatened with physical violence and, in extreme cases, physically attacked.Peru is receiving around 150 million dollars from different sources of international financing and national counterparts for programs of forest conservation and management that – directly or indirectly – contribute to reducing carbon emissions from deforestation or forest degradation (Redd). However, this investigation suggests that Peruvian authorities currently have little capacity to control what’s happening in their forests. the results of this report demonstrate that the ministry of Agriculture – responsible for Production Forests – isn’t adequately monitoring the concessions in its purview; that the ministry of environment – responsible for Protected Forests – isn’t sufficiently preventing illegal logging in the forests under its charge; and that the Regional governments do not yet have the capacity to impede illegal activities in the field nor to follow up on the legal cases that do arise.