The Ghana Timber Millers Organisation (GTMO) strongly endorses all earlier statements of condemnation by progressive-oriented organisations on the barbaric attack on the Babatokuma Timber Monitoring Checkpoint of the Forestry Commission in the Bono East Region during which state propertywas destroyed, and staff of the Forestry Commission at work serving the
good interest of Ghana were injured on Tuesday, 9 June 2026.
The GTMO is shocked and disappointed by such an incident where members of a timber trade association can attack the staff of the Forestry Commission on an unsubstantiated allegation that the staff at the timber monitoring checkpoint are destroying their timber business.
The reasons for the destruction of the facility and the injury caused to the staff constitute a criminal offence, and the perpetrators must be fished out, arrested and put before the court.
The actions of these timber traders are a blatant disregard for the laws of this
country under democratic governance. The timber industry and trade in timber products in Ghana operate within a well-defined policy and legal framework that every timber trader is required to follow.
There are specified channels and laid-out procedures for seeking redress to all grievances in the timber trade. The timber sector does not operate in isolation where jungle laws are permitted.
Over the past two decades, the Forestry Commission has been working in collaboration with timber trade associations (including GTMO at the forefront) to bring down the wanton destruction of timber production areas by illegal loggers and illegal timber traders.
One such intervention is the expansion of timber tracking and monitoring activities, which requires the installation of checkpoints. At these designated checkpoints, the transporter of timber and wood products is required to provide specific documents to
validate the original source of the raw material and to demonstrate compliance with specific regulations in the timber trade.
All legal timber operators have received training at numerous workshops on
what to do and what not to do in the timber trade. Every legal operator has also been made aware of all the necessary documentations required at every
phase of the business. Operators who provide the required documentation are permitted to move on to their destination markets.
Without holding brief for the perpetrators, it is a fact that most times vehicles spend long hours at the checkpoints waiting for clearance (due to the usual bureaucracies and logistical challenges). However, situations like this can never warrant the destruction of state property and causing injury to innocent workers. At the commencement of the expanded timber taskforce and monitoring program, the GTMO, which handles the largest volume of
timber, also had some concerns, but the matter was approached in a business
manner.
No serious business operator who wants to run a successful and sustainable business will ever think of seeking redress in the manner that was embarked on at Babatokuma.
The GTMO is in support of the efforts being made by the Forestry Commission and all well-meaning stakeholders in arresting the increasing rate of illegal timber trade and associated social disorders. Ghana has
established a robust timber harvesting regulatory system that has been
recognised among the best in the tropical world.
Unfortunately, over the past decade some groups of people have been running down the system by forcefully and violently entering production forests and making away with huge volumes of valuable timber.
These illegally sourced logs are further sawn in unregistered mills, and the lumber is smuggled into the supply chain, thus contaminating the market with illegal materials. The existence of the lucrative illegal lumber market is continuously fueling illegal logging activities and destroying our forests at an unprecedented fast rate. Large
tracts of forests in Bono, Ahafo, and Western Regions are now under siege.
It is an established fact that the illegal lumber from these areas is moving across the northern border into the Sahelian countries mainly through the Techiman-Tamale-Bolga-Paga route. It is in this respect that the FC is
applying stricter control measures in these areas.
Members of the Ghana Timber Millers Organisation strongly support the FC
in fighting this menace. GTMO is calling on all stakeholders, especially forest-owning communities, National House of Chiefs, environmental NGOs, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Interior, consumers of
timber and wood products to support the fight against illegal timber exploitation and trade.
The development has become a national security issue that must be tackled with all seriousness.
If this unfortunate development is not effectively controlled, genuine and legal timber businesses will collapse sooner or later, which will lead to massive job
losses and a decline in foreign exchange earnings.
Signed
Dr Kwame Asamoah Adam CEO-GTMO
(For the President GTMO)
