Illegal logging practices pose some of the most pervasive and significant threats to the health and safety of forests today. Neamț County in Romania is among the places seeing the long-term consequences firsthand.
This summer, a user on the Europe subreddit posted an image taken by drone of an area near the Bistrița River in Neamț County. Despite abutting rich society and infrastructure, the nearby forest looks like an apocalyptic wasteland with hardly a trace of trees outside the nearby town.
Many commenters on the post were quick to point fingers at the major furniture retail chain IKEA for being a driving cause of excessive and unregulated logging in the region. Indeed, IKEA had already been under investigation, per Mongabay, for its logging actions in Romania to acquire lumber for its supply chain.
The issue underlying excessive logging in the country appears to be that while Romania has land procurement laws in place under the European Union, these laws have been criticized as relatively weak when it comes to regulating suppliers.
According to a 2024 report by environmental groups Agent Green and the Bruno Manser Fonds, "The EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 requires EU countries to strictly protect at least 10 percent of their territory and partially protect at least 30 percent." However, the groups said, the figures for Ingka Investments — IKEA's franchisee in Romania — were only about 1 percent and 8 percent, respectively.
"No, the illegal loggers mix real lumber with the illegal one. As far as IKEA is concerned, there is no way to tell what is legit or not," one commenter wrote under the Reddit post.
"This topic makes me so, so sad!" wrote another.
Declining to patronize brands that fail to reliably implement authentically eco-friendly practices and oversight is one step that consumers can take. More broadly, advocates generally agree that both countries and corporations will need to take greater accountability for the consequences of their actions — or inaction. Closing loopholes and enhancing oversight of those who might exploit them for economic gain could be key to combating excessive logging and environmental harm.
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