Zambian Officials and Chinese Businessmen Illegally Export Rosewood to China

The Environmental Investigation Agency recently published a report titled "Mukula Cartel: How Timber Tafficking Networks Plunder Zambian Forests."

Senior Zambian officials have reportedly orchestrated and facilitated massive trafficking operations that are driving mukula rosewood trees to the edge of commercial extinction, devastating vulnerable forests, and threatening communities' livelihoods. The State-owned company Zambia Forestry and Forest Industries Corporation Limited (ZAFFICO) is secretly used as a cover for well-connected Zambian officials and Chinese business operators to export thousands of mukula logs, despite a ban on their export. The overwhelming majority of the logs goes to China. This expose quotes Chinese entrepreneurs who engage in bribery to facilitate the exports.