“Don’t go there; you’ll be eaten by the bear,” we were told by four men in the village of Lekbibaj in the region of Tropoja in northern Albania.
The men’s “advice” was clearly a warning to us that it would be better to stay away.
We stopped in Lekbibaj on our way to Vrana e Madhe, where a group of residents denounced the illegal felling of trees in the local forest about two years ago.
On the road to Lekbibaj we passed many trucks loaded with massive logs. The unpaved roads and tracks in the forest used by such trucks and the evidence of large-scale logging are plain for all to see.
Destruction of Albanian forests
Albanian forests have been decimated over the past three decades. So much so that Tropoja is one of the only remaining areas in the country where beech trees, which are highly prized in the wood-processing industry, can still be found.
“In the last 20 years, Albania has lost approximately 33% of its woody biomass,” says Abdulla Diku, a forestry engineer who has been studying the situation in Albanian forests for years.
Indeed, the latest report published by Global Forest Watch says that Albania has lost 6.5% of its total area covered by forests in the last two decades.
Moratorium on commercial logging
In an attempt to protect its forests, Albania introduced a ten-year moratorium on commercial logging in 2016. This means that the felling of trees in forests for commercial purposes is prohibited until 2026.
The only permissible exception to the moratorium is the cutting down of trees for firewood for families and public institutions such as schools, preschools and health institutions.
Families must apply to their municipality for permission to fell trees to obtain firewood for their own personal use.
Companies have to get a license to be allowed to fell trees for firewood for public institutions.
Even so, not all trees in Albania’s forests can be felled: A special team that includes forest engineers marks the trees that have been identified for firewood.
Moratorium ignored by some
But despite the moratorium, sawmills are in operation almost right across the country. Most of these sawmills are informal and are not even registered as businesses.
But of those sawmills that are officially licensed to fell trees for firewood, some apparently go one step further, intentionally cutting down the trees that are most valuable for processing and not those that have been earmarked for firewood.
“They load their trucks with the highest-quality beech wood. The parcels of land for which they have permission to cut down trees are not touched, while trees in the parcels with the highest-quality wood are cut down on a massive scale. No rules are observed; they cut what they like,” Ahmet Mehmeti, an experienced forestry engineer, told DW.
The role of local government
According to Albanian law, it is the responsibility of local authorities to manage and control activities in the forests, including commercial forest exploitation.
“We have sporadic cases of illegal logging, but we cannot say that it is a widespread phenomenon,” said Pjeter Imeraj, administrator for Lekbibaj within the municipality of Tropoja.
Imeraj told DW that it is his duty to inform the municipality about the amount of firewood that will be needed during the winter season and confirms whether the amounts requested by public institutions are fair and realistic. The municipality then decides how many trees need to be felled.
Only one company in the tender process
The municipality told DW that a tendering process is used to determine which companies may fell trees for firewood. It did not provide any details about the contract concluded with Alxhef shpk, the company that won the tender, and told us instead to consult the website of the Public Procurements Agency of Albania for details.
According to the agency’s website, Alxhef shpk was the only bidder in the tender process — something economic experts consider a red flag.
“We have implemented everything stipulated in the contract and have processed only fallen and rotten trees and we haven’t cut or transported timber beyond what we were contracted for,” Xhafer Fiora, owner of Alxhef shpk, told DW.
Products destined for the USA
Alxhef shpk has many years of experience in the sector, including in the production, trade and import/export of almost all types of timber and timber products.
Its main client, which it has been supplying for over 10 years, is Minelli Spa. This company is part of the Italian Minelli Group, which manufactures high-quality wood products, such as stocks for sporting and recreational rifles, handles for brushes, knives and brooms, and components for wooden toys.
While these products are sold in Italy and elsewhere, the US is the biggest market.
Italy: Albania’s main market for timber
According to official data from Albania’s Institute of Statistics (INSTAT), exports of wood (mainly charcoal wood) decreased slightly in the period 2012–2023. Nevertheless, Italy is still the country to which Albania exports most timber and paper products.
The Observatory of Economic Complexity, an online data visualization and distribution platform that analyzes economic activities, shows that Albania began exporting timber to Italy in 1995. According to its data, 71.7% of Albania’s wood exports were sent to Italy in 2015, a year before the moratorium came into effect.
The General Directorate of Customs in Albania declined to make available any data relating to the import and export of wood for the last 10 years, including customs codes for the type of wood exported.
The role of the EUTR
Minelli says it was not aware of the accusations of illegal logging made by residents of Tropoja two years ago and that the moratorium has not changed the dynamics of its cooperation with Alxhef shpk.
“We know that Alxhef imports from Montenegro and Kosovo, because we have the documentation we need for registration in accordance with EUTR 995/2010,” said Marcello Minelli of Alxhef shpk’s Italian client Minelli.
The European Union Timber Regulation (EUTR) came into force in 2013. Its objective was to combat the illegal logging of timber and its products.
In theory, the regulation prevents illegal timber from entering the EU market and stipulates that timber entering the bloc must be accompanied by documents that show, among other things, the origin of the wood and the species of tree.
Moratorium is not enough
Italian EUTR experts say that the regulation has more moral than legal force.
Davide Pettenella, professor of forest economics at the University of Padua and former Balkans consultant for the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), says that “the EUTR would not stop illegal activity from Albania because the system is created for traceable and legal wood, but in a chain of corruption, which starts with illegal logging and then [continues with] controls at customs, measurements, sales and exports, it is almost impossible.”
Sources from the Italian forestry police admit that they operate mainly on the basis of documentation checks and only conduct random checks in the field every two years.
The EU also highlighted problems with the implementation of the moratorium in its 2024 report on Albania’s progress on reforms undertaken as part of the EU accession process. “Concerns over the insufficient enforcement of Albania’s forest and logging laws remain,” it wrote in the report. “Despite the moratorium on logging, these practices continue unchecked.”
Edited by: Aingeal Flanagan
This investigation was conducted with the support of Journalismfund Europe.
