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At 9,400 square miles, slightly larger than New Hampshire, Olancho is the largest of Honduras’ eighteen departments and makes up one-fifth of the country’s territory. Forests, mostly conifers, cover 67.9 percent of this sparsely populated department. Its rugged territory is criss-crossed by mountains separated by broad valleys, and the higher reaches of its peaks house some of the densest, most extensive cloud forests in Central America.

This ecological mosaic is also one of the most environmentally threatened places in Central America. The destruction of the huge rainforest in Oaxaca, Mexico -- the result of rampant, indiscriminate logging--is now being mirrored in Olancho. And, as in Mexico, the effects promise to be widespread ecological devastation for generations to come.

In mid-February, 2004, Center for International Policy (CIP) staff visited Honduras to conduct its own investigation into the extent of forest degradation and to examine firsthand its impact on the local environment and communities.

(Click here to check out photos from the delegation's scoping trip to Olancho)

Accompanied by several of the MAO’s (Environmental Movement of Olancho) religious and community leaders, the delegation met with a number of representatives from human rights and environmental groups, and community organizations. They visited various municipalities in Olancho hardest hit by illegal logging: Salamá, Jano, Juticalpa, Catacamas, Gualaco/San Esteban, and Campamento. The group witnessed logging operations in remote and isolated private and national forestlands and noted many clear violations of the law: trees harvested next to water sources or on roadsides; trees felled on slopes and steep areas, leaving the area susceptible to erosion; large tracts of land denuded of forest cover; seedling pine trees being harvested; and, ironically, many felled trees simply abandoned.