A new report released by the Environmental Investigation Agency says developed countries can help stop the destruction of forest in the Indonesian province of Papua by banning the import of illegal timber.
The EIA says US Free Trade agreements with other timber trading nations are accelerating the destruction of the world's tropical forests.
Last year, the EIA exposed an illegal timber smuggling operation from Papua to China by Malaysian nationals worth a billion US dollars per year.
The EIA's Alexander von Bismarck says subsequently there was an initial crackdown on illegal logging of Papua merbau by authorities in Indonesia's central government.
But he says timber barons have a lot of influence over officials all along the enforcement chain.
"And when you have a country like Malaysia which is unfortunately famous for its laundering of Papuan timber, then having a Free Trade agreement just opens the floodgates for that illegal timber to come into markets such as the US market which has this voracious demand for cheap timber and that makes the consumers mostly unwitting participants in the destruction of forest in Papua for example."
