Chileans Rise to Defense of Shrinking Forests : Environment: Critics worry that turning native timber into pulp risks resource depletion, decreased biological diversity and soil erosion.

Trucks loaded with hardwood logs are raising dust on the country roads of southern Chile and alarm among Chileans who want to preserve this country’s shrinking native forests.

One after the other, the trucks arrive at a plant where a huge machine grinds the bark off the logs, then noisily chews them into small chips used for making paper. Tawny mountains of chips rise by the docks of Puerto Montt, awaiting shipment to Japan.

Critics say the chip trade is devastating privately owned remnants of temperate rain forest south of the 39th Parallel in this long, narrow country. They warn of such dire results as resource depletion, lost biological diversity, soil erosion, silting in rivers and damaged watersheds.

But the issue is not simple: Some forestry experts say that much of the cutting is being done in already degraded woodlands where thinning is needed so that valuable species can regenerate.

Still, nearly everyone agrees that too little is known about managing these ecologically unique forests and not enough is being done to monitor the cutting. No one seems to have a clear notion of just how much damage is really being done.

What worries ecologists about southern Chile is essentially what worries them about the Amazon or the Pacific Northwest--the possible sacrifice of irreplaceable natural forests before their true value is known and appreciated.

Puerto Montt is in the heart of the Valdivian Forest belt, land with a temperate climate and heavy rainfall that nurture dense woods with prolific undergrowth. The belt stretches from near the city of Temuco in the north to Puerto Aisen in the south, or from 39 to 45 degrees south latitude.

Few other temperate regions produce forests as rich in plant species. The Valdivian Forest is composed of more than 20 different hardwoods, with names like coigue, tepa, ulmo, rauli, radal and lingue.

Virgin forest also harbors conifers--sometimes including alerce redwoods, which live for thousands of years--and a vast variety of bushes, shrubs, ferns and other plants. Some of them have yet to be classified scientifically.

“We’re losing this cold jungle without even knowing what was in it,” said Nicole Mintz, an American ecologist who lives in Chile.

Mintz, who belongs to a California-based group named Ancient Forests International, suggested a moratorium on cutting until studies and plans can be prepared to give authorities a better basis for regulating native woodlands.

“Really, nobody knows what is going on in the native forests,” she said.

The National Committee for Defense of the Flora and Fauna protests constantly against destruction of native forest but admits that its efforts are often futile. The committee, known as CODEFF, is Chile’s main ecology organization.

Eduardo Alvar, the CODEFF representative in Puerto Montt, said the cutting of native trees for chipping began about five years ago in the Puerto Montt region. Last year it spread south into the provinces of Chiloe and Chaiten, Alvar said.

Chilean law prohibits the cutting of native woods on steep hillsides and along the banks of rivers and creeks. Any exploitation must be done according to approved forest management plans that limit cutting and provide for reforestation.

But Alvar said landowners lack the know-how and resources for carrying out management plans, and they often are tempted to cut destructively to earn quick cash and clear land for pastures or planting.

CONAF, the Chilean government forest service, and the national police are responsible for enforcing regulations. But Alvar said few violators are prosecuted and even fewer are convicted by local courts.

Klaus Ibert, a German forestry student who is is writing a thesis on Chile’s native forests, said many creeks are drying up in the summer because woodlands that retain winter rainwater are being cut for chips. “The biggest problem is that CONAF lacks personnel to control things,” Ibert said.

He was visiting an area where some ranchers fear that deforested watersheds will result in a scarcity of water for their cattle. On the dirt road through the area, trucks hauling logs rumbled by throughout the day.

At the CONAF offices in Puerto Montt, Gerardo Elzo acknowledged that the forest service does not have the means to monitor cutting by farmers. “It is practically impossible to control,” he said.

Elzo, who is regional chief of forest resources, predicted that more and more privately owned native woods will be turned into pasture and croplands. The price of logs for chipping pays for the expensive work of land-clearing, he said.

But Fernando Moraga, another CONAF official in Puerto Montt, said in a separate interview that chipping and other woodcutting activities are not a major threat to southern Chile’s native forests.

CONAF’s goals are to regenerate degraded woodlands through scientific forest management and to replant cleared areas that are unproductive as farmland. Last year in the Puerto Montt region, CONAF helped reforest native species on 740 acres, a figure it plans to double this year, Moraga said.

That is a tiny portion of the land in southern Chile that has been deforested, eroded and rendered useless even for pasture. Patricio Corvalan, a forestry professor at the University of Chile, said a 1985 study near Puerto Montt revealed that half of nearly 1 million acres surveyed had degenerated into unusable brushland after deforestation.

More than 30 million acres of Chilean forest, mostly in the south, are protected in parks and reserves. Estimates of surviving native forests in private hands vary widely, up to 19 million acres.

A fiery national debate is currently crackling over how those privately owned woods should be regulated. A special Forestry Commission has been appointed by the government to propose new legislation.

The private forest industry association, known as CORMA, is lobbying for a proposal that would allow owners of any native forests not on slopes of 45 degrees or more to replace them with exotic species such as Monterey pine and eucalyptus.

CODEFF, the ecology group, argues that such a policy would invite the destruction of the country’s most valuable native forests.

The forestry industry has grown into one of Chile’s main export earners, bringing in $913 million in 1991--more than 20 times its annual foreign revenues in the early 1970s. And chip exports have become increasingly important since they began in 1986. In 1991, chips brought in $151 million.

The main chip company in the Puerto Montt area is Forestal del Sur, owned by Marc Rich & Co. of Switzerland. It sells virtually all of its production to Japanese paper pulp producers.

Javier Ovalle, the Chilean manager of the company’s chipping plant near Puerto Montt, contends that the total biomass of native forests is growing despite the amounts of wood being cut. Nevertheless, he said, the company has created a subsidiary to plant eucalyptus trees for chipping in the future.

The eucalyptus trees will be planted on land deforested long ago, Ovalle emphasized. Public protests have stopped a project near Corral, 125 miles to the north, for replacing 57,000 acres of native forest with eucalyptus.