1.   Conserving Matters Steps are at last being taken to create a formal structure for checking the sources of sustainably managed tropical timber.

2.   Early last year the North Hertfordshire branch of Friends of the Earth conducted a survey of importers of tropical timber.

3.   The first-stage trees are largely used for pulp, while the second-stage ones are the bulk of the tropical timber industry.

4.   Despite its concern, Europe is still the biggest importer of tropical timber.

5.   The report warns against an international boycott of tropical timber, arguing that if forests become unprofitable, then wasteful deforestation will occur.

6.   He urged wealthy nations to plant tropical hardwoods in desert lands, thereby tripling the area under tropical timber within a century.

7.   The Ministers resolved to oppose any unilateral bans on the import of tropical timber, and declared the sovereign right of states to develop their own natural resources.

8.   Austria is to abandon a law, adopted last September, requiring mandatory labelling of tropical timber imports.