Floating wood near Port-Gentil, province of Ogooué-Maritime, Gabon (0°43’ S, 8°47’ E).

These raw logs were transported to the coast by road and by train then towed in rafts on the Ogooué River. They will be loaded on cargo ships bound for China or for Europe. Gabon is the first wood exporter of Okoumé (Aucoumea klaineana), a forest essence in great demand for the manufacturing of plywood. It represents near half of the two million cubic meters of wood exported annually. The objective of the country is not to increased its production –quotas are effective in the name of the "sustainable development" of forest resources– but to saw and transform the raw timber to create jobs and increase receipts stemmed from the exploitation of forests, an activity which contributes to 60% of the Gabonese GDP, when oil included. But forestry is not without impacts: dirt roads opened by the loggers facilitate poaching and forest concessions encroach on territories where live communities of Pygmies.