The environmental crime of illegal logging creates a layered web of exploitation. Natural resources, protected lands, and threatened species of plants and trees are exploited as well as trafficked labour. Criminal networks often force indigenous populations into slavery and other non-indigenous victims are trafficked to illegally harvest timber. Illegal logging represents 10-30% of the wood trade globally and can rise in significant tropical timber-producing countries to 50-90% as cited in a 2016 Thomson Reuters paper. According to a 2017 report from Global Financial Integrity, illegal logging is the most lucrative crime pertaining to natural resources and constitutes US $52 – $157 billion in profits. Organized crime groups as well as terrorist networks are reaping in these profits with illegal logging creating lower risk but yet very high return.

This webinar will address the following discussion questions: how is illegal logging a catalyst for human trafficking as well as other criminal activities? How does illegal logging create risks for not only those most vulnerable to human trafficking but to business and international financial institutions? How can the private sector, working with governments and civil society, combat human trafficking within this illicit industry?

Panelists:

• Brian Huerbsch, Senior Research Analyst, Thomson Reuters
• Channing May, CAMS, Policy Analyst, Global Financial Integrity
• Chris McLaren, Chief Marketing Officer, Forest Stewardship Council-US

Moderator: Nicolas A. Eslava, Director, Afai Consulting BV and Founder and Advisor, Fundación Ava Jeva Amazonía

Date: Thursday, February 22, 2018 at 10:00 am – 12:00 pm ET/ 4:00 – 6:00 pm CET

Additional resources from the speakers for this webinar:

• Environmental governance in post-conflict scenarios: insights from the Colombian Amazon, by Nicolas A. Eslava
• The cost of environmental crime: Illegal Logging, by Brian Huerbsch
• Transnational Crime and the Developing World, by Channing May, Global Financial Integrity

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This webinar is co-hosted by the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime, Babson College’s Initiative on Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in cooperationwith the Terrorism, Transnational Crime and Corruption Center (TraCCC) at George Mason University and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Center of Excellence in Criminal Network Analysis (CINA).