The NGO has not specifically urged a boycott, but says that its estimates that up to 80% of logging in the state is illegal make it a major challenge to buy timber in compliance with the requirements of the EU Timber Regulation.
"Undertaking sufficient risk mitigation against that background is extremely difficult," said Greenpeace Amazon campaign project leader Daniela Montalto. "The paperwork claiming legality may look genuine, but it cannot be taken at face value. In fact, the only way to satisfy the terms of the EUTR, given the degree of risk, would be to get out there on the ground in person and track chain of custody right back to the forest."
Following a two-year investigation into the Amazonian timber and forestry industry, Greenpeace made its allegations about the high incidence of illegal timber laundering in its "The Amazon’s Silent Crisis" report in May.
Subsequently in the UK it alleged that Jewson and International Timber had sourced potentially illegal Para timber. It has also made ‘substantiated complaints’ about illegal imports to the UK EUTR enforcement agency, or competent authority (CA), the National Measurement Office (NMO).
Subsequently Jewson parent Saint-Gobain Building Distribution confirmed to the green group that it had removed Brazilian ipe from its shelves.
Ms Montalto said that European importers should have been aware of allegations of illegality against some of Para’s leading timber suppliers.
"There is a bank of information in the public domain and the Para federal prosecutors office has also ordered that every forestry management plan in the state be investigated because of poor levels of compliance."
A significant proportion of legality documentation in Pará was faked, based on false information or "obtained on the black market, or through bribery", she maintained.
As well as the NMO, Greenpeace has put "substantiated complaints" about timber imports from Para to the CAs of the countries accounting for the "majority of European Amazonian trade"; Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, France and Belgium. In the last two it has provided "specific information" on suspect shipments.
Ms Montalto said that illegality in Para and neighbouring Mato Grosso demanded urgent action from the Brazilian government.
"It is difficult to see how overseas customers can feel safe about buying their timber until problems on the ground have been fixed," she said.
She added that FSC certification of the timber would provide evidence of risk mitigation under the EUTR. "But volumes from this region are limited," she said.
