A new White House study argues that logging around the world would increase by no more than 0.5 percent if the World Trade Organization liberalized global trade in forest products, as the U.S. is advocating. The study admits that logging in Indonesia, Chile, Malaysia, and several other nations would increase sharply under a proposal to slash tariffs on forest products, but it claims that timber cutting in France, Japan, Mexico, Russia, and a few other nations would decrease. In the U.S., the proposal would cause a reduction in log exports and a shift from production of raw logs to processed wood products, the study found. Enviros say the study is flawed and are calling on Pres. Clinton to abandon the proposal to cut tariffs.
