by Guest999 » Sun Oct 04, 2020 2:15 am
Longwinded Preface:
I recall a long ago PPPost article with an environmentalist referencing a young bear and explaining, "If you come across wild animals for sale, don't rescue, or buy. By taking 'product' out of a market with existing needs, you perpetuate the killing!"
A bit later, thirsty while awaiting transport, I sat and ordered a beer from a Poipet roadside seller, just as a glossy new Landcrusier was pulling away. The seller was chatty. Her friend had previously sold the virginity of her niece to the Landcruiser owning Customs Officer, $600 for 5 days together, and my drink seller thought the family of the dirt poor 15 year-old working for her would be interested in the offer he had just communicated. My transport arrived and I left, but I turned the conversation over in my mind all the way to Battambang. I should have, I decided, walked the girl into HOPE, some 'US Faith funded' NGO up the street. I dislike most of the proselytizing I see in Cambodia, but good stuff happens too. ((Hard to argue with 15 western doctors, dentists, and nurses arriving in a provincial village for a week of free clinics.)) Importantly, the environmentalist's logic not to rescue bears, or girls, didn't feel compelling.)
Buying Cambodian tropical hardwoods isn't nearly equivalent to rescuing young virgins, but if I buy a few cubic meters to keep them in Cambodia, compared to the tens of thousands of C.M. that leave the country every year, I don't feel I'm significantly growing the market. (Of course you can argue the 'market machine' for virgins, prostitutes, wild animals, or board feet is maintained unit by unit, and every single purchase/use, as far as The Evil Machine eating that product is concerned, is equally bad when taken as a whole.
And anyway, I hope planting thousands of trees has preloaded, a bit, my forest cruelty karma.
FINALLY getting to the point.
So, anyway, once back in Cambodia, I'd maybe like to buy 1-3 cubic meters. Beng, Thnong, Koki, etc., Luxury, or some Grade 1 timber, depends. Prefer large, rough-cut OK also. (Not interested in getting busted buying illegal Rosewood sticks. Not interested in getting busted.)
Around/just after the last election was a relatively good price, heaps of cutting, with a bit less buying. Anyone know if countryside prices for quality timber have dropped in 2020, since the pandemic? Do you expect them to this coming dry season?
Longwinded Preface:
I recall a long ago PPPost article with an environmentalist referencing a young bear and explaining, "If you come across wild animals for sale, don't rescue, or buy. By taking 'product' out of a market with existing needs, you perpetuate the killing!"
A bit later, thirsty while awaiting transport, I sat and ordered a beer from a Poipet roadside seller, just as a glossy new Landcrusier was pulling away. The seller was chatty. Her friend had previously sold the virginity of her niece to the Landcruiser owning Customs Officer, $600 for 5 days together, and my drink seller thought the family of the dirt poor 15 year-old working for her would be interested in the offer he had just communicated. My transport arrived and I left, but I turned the conversation over in my mind all the way to Battambang. I should have, I decided, walked the girl into HOPE, some 'US Faith funded' NGO up the street. I dislike most of the proselytizing I see in Cambodia, but good stuff happens too. ((Hard to argue with 15 western doctors, dentists, and nurses arriving in a provincial village for a week of free clinics.)) Importantly, the environmentalist's logic not to rescue bears, or girls, didn't feel compelling.)
Buying Cambodian tropical hardwoods isn't nearly equivalent to rescuing young virgins, but if I buy a few cubic meters to keep them in Cambodia, compared to the tens of thousands of C.M. that leave the country every year, I don't feel I'm significantly growing the market. (Of course you can argue the 'market machine' for virgins, prostitutes, wild animals, or board feet is maintained unit by unit, and every single purchase/use, as far as The Evil Machine eating that product is concerned, is equally bad when taken as a whole.
And anyway, I hope planting thousands of trees has preloaded, a bit, my forest cruelty karma.
FINALLY getting to the point.
So, anyway, once back in Cambodia, I'd maybe like to buy 1-3 cubic meters. Beng, Thnong, Koki, etc., Luxury, or some Grade 1 timber, depends. Prefer large, rough-cut OK also. (Not interested in getting busted buying illegal Rosewood sticks. Not interested in getting busted.)
Around/just after the last election was a relatively good price, heaps of cutting, with a bit less buying. Anyone know if countryside prices for quality timber have dropped in 2020, since the pandemic? Do you expect them to this coming dry season?