(Ed. Note: Aaron Sanger is an attorney working for
environmental NGO Forest Ethics. In 2003 he forced an environmental agreement with the Arauco and CMPC logging companies after initiating a U.S.-based boycott on Chilean wood products. The issue sparked a series of debates between environmentalists and loggers, leading to a “new deal” in the relationship between the seemingly opposite arguments for the protection and exploitation of the native forest. In this feature article, “Qué Pasa” magazine explores the new relationship between Chile's logging businesses and environmental groups.)

After organizing an aggressive campaign against Chilean logging companies in the U.S., he pulled off an unusual native forest protection agreement in 2003 with CMPC and Arauco, which is still in effect. An uncommon environmentalist, this American attorney lives in Villarica and works as a mediator for environment-related NGOs and the aforementioned companies, properties of the Matte and Angelini families. "I use a carrot-and-stick policy, as opposed to Tompkins," he says.

On May 1, 2003, the air at the Home Depot offices in Atlanta was so thick, you could cut it with scissors. For the first time, the representatives of the two biggest logging companies in Chile and worldwide, Arauco and CMPC, met face to face with their eternal rivals: the environmentalists.

The campaign launched in different continents months ago by American NGO Forest Ethics to boycott the sale of Chilean wood had left its imprint: a dozen big buyers and distributors abstained from acquiring Chilean products. While this happened, hundreds of consumers protested outside Home Depot because the company hadn’t stopped buying from Angelini and Matte, who represent 80 percent of Chile’s logging exports. What started for Chileans as yet another criticism of their replacement of native forests by plantations had become an avalanche that had to be stopped.

The meeting lasted for five hours. There were moments in which the tension was so high the loggers threatened to leave. But then, attorney Aaron Sanger, Forest Ethics environmentalist and one of the creators of the campaign, decided to calm down the atmosphere and centered the discussion on one single objective: that Chilean corporations sign a written agreement not to substitute native forests or provide incentives for others to do the same. This is because, according to the environmentalists, the massive expansion of the Chilean logging industry - which this year will export nearly US$ 4 billion – is directly related to the devastation of native forest.

The NGOs present in the meeting - five American and five Chilean - were largely surprised when Arauco and CMPC agreed to sign. This historical moment - consummated in November 2003 and still valid - made the cover of the Wall Street Journal as an example to the world's forest industries. Everyone present agreed that Sanger was the great mastermind of the new relationship between loggers and environmentalists.

The 49-year-old attorney - who graduated with honors from the University of Texas and who holds an MA in Scientific and Technical Communications - never imagined that the ten years he lived in Oregon (1995-2005) would change his life. According to Sanger, the ancient oak and pine forests characteristic of this area in the U.S. “filled me with a special energy very difficult to describe.”

During his 20-year career, he basically dealt with environmental lawsuits (“although never against logging companies,” he adds). The great leap forward came around 1990 when he took the case of 166 residents of a poor neighborhood in Austin, Texas living near oil tankers. The lawsuit was against none other than Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Texaco. After five years of litigation, the court ordered the corporations to remove the tankers, clean the area and pay damage compensation to the plaintiffs, as well as handling all the long-term health problems they may develop.

From then on, Sanger's office filled with environmental lawsuits. He won them all. The lawyer remembers two things that set him on the path to rethinking environmentalism: he wasn't satisfied because whatever he did “he could not change the system,” and he felt very happy with his voluntary work in social and environmental matters. That is why, in 1999, he left his job and dedicated himself completely to environmental NGOs, because this way “he could achieve a larger impact.”

He left for the Boston´s Green Corps for one year, and then moved to San Francisco to the Forest Ethics office. While this organization is small in comparison to Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Federation (WWF) (they only have offices in Chile, the U.S. and Canada), its methods are more aggressive.

Sanger's first job was to research the impact of launching a campaign in the U.S. to defend Chilean native forests. A couple of years earlier he had met Malú Sierra, from Defenders of the Forest (Defensores del Bosque), to whom he explained the work that several NGOs had carried out in British Columbia, Canada. Due to intense pressure from activists, in April 2001, loggers, big business, indigenous communities and NGOs signed an agreement - the first one of its kind worldwide - to protect hundreds of hectares in the Big Bear Forest. Sanger's idea was to apply the same strategy in Chile. It took him two years to prepare the campaign, during which time he first came to Santiago. Together with local NGOs Greenpeace, Defensores del Bosque, and Instituto de Ecología Política, among others, he sent hundreds of letters to businesses, government agencies, distributors and importers. Meanwhile, he called upon the environmentalists: Forest Ethics was in charge of striking in Chile; Rainforest Action Network in Indonesia; and others in Canada. "They centered their efforts on Home Depot because they thought this corporation could bring about the necessary changes," remembers one of the executives involved in the campaign.

Thanks to his good contacts in the media, Sanger wrote about the campaign in the New York Times. The results were immediate. In January 2003, a dozen companies, among them Anderson Corporation (a leading window-molding manufacturer), announced they would only buy from FSC certified Chilean loggers. Other buyers such as Alexandria Molding and Golden State Lumber decided the same.

To the environmentalists this was a big success: Anderson's deal alone jeopardized a US$ 30 million contract with Chilean suppliers. Even then, Chilean companies deemed the campaign "ridiculous," remembers one of their managers. But it only took a phone call from Sanger to Home Depot's environmental manager, Roland Jarvis, to convince CMPC and Arauco of the necessity for negotiations. Jarvis invited them to Atlanta to hear the activist's position firsthand, surprised that the companies had never established a roundtable to discuss these matters.

At the meeting, Sanger didn’t hide his negotiating wisdom. "Some NGOs wanted to use this opportunity to discuss other topics, such as the use of chemicals on cellulose, but Aaron was centered the discussion only on the native forest," says Arauco. A businessman confesses that this way of approaching the issue, later emulated by local environmentalists, went down well with the engineers. Yet people close to Sanger claim that his greatest talent is his good use of language; "He is mindful of using the right words to avoid alienating either side."

Since that first visit, Sanger has come to Chile 15 times. In February 2006, the Wall Street Journal published an extensive article about the new relationship between environmentalists and big business. They mentioned the case of Arauco and CMPC, since the agreement has made much progress. There are already 500,000 hectares of protected forest land, biological corridors have been designated and incentives to avoid replanting have stopped. Arauco has also created a flora and fauna conservation net and, together with CMPC, they have started to identify the zones with the highest conservation value within the Nahuelbuta mountain range.

Sanger's influence in American public debate is noticeable. He writes columns, gives speeches at universities and has written several books. In February 2006 he taught a class at MIT called “Collaboration between NGOs and Industry: Trap or Opportunity?” He also participated in a forum in Portland that gathered the planet's forestry leaders and dealt with the objectives of environmental pressure campaigns.

Corporations agree that Sanger has very good contacts with U.S. environmentalists. His role models have been Paul Hawken (author of “Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution“) and Jared Diamond (author of “Collapse”). To him, his best contacts are high executives of big companies such as Roland Jarvis from Home Depot, Shari Carle from Dell computers and Gregor Barnum from Seventh Generation. “To my mind all three of them are environmentalists and have real power to produce palpable change,” he says.

He has lived in Chile for one year. He settled down in the lush forests in Villarica with one objective: to create a company together with the Chilean Foundation (Fundación Chile) to help small native forest owners use their land more efficiently. Eco-management, the new firm, will be the first of its kind worldwide and, should it succeed, will allow a change in landowner mentality about the native forest’s not having economic value.

Eliodoro Matte, owner of CMPC and possessor of one of the largest fortunes in the country (US$ 4 billion), has become a leader in establishing dialogue with the environmental scene. His efforts were crowned last April at a CEP seminary with Douglas Tompkins attending as a guest.

It was there when Sanger met Matte in person. They ran into each other during the coffee break and the businessman said: “You are a popular man indeed.” Although there was little time for an exchange of ideas, the president of the paper manufacturer is supportive of what is being done with the native forest and the protected areas of Nahuelbuta. "Since day one at the meeting in Atlanta, we have experienced a great deal of support from the directory and especially by Matte," said a CMPC spokesperson.

Sanger does not shy away from praising Matte. "He has a lot of respect for environmentalists. He knows well the responsibility and the opportunity Chilean corporations have to become leaders in environmental and social issues.” He also claims to have learned a lot from Tompkins, with whom he shares some beliefs. But he regards their strategies as different: “Mine is less ideologically driven. I am a fan of the carrot-and-stick method. Doug's is a deep environmentalism.”

On December 13, 2006, a meeting was held in Concepción in which, as opposed to previous meetings, access was granted to several new social groups. Representatives of environmental agencies Conama, Codeff, Conaf and WWF, the University of La Frontera, the University of Concepción and Mapuche leaders were invited. Everyone was inspired by the existing dialogue between environmentalists and corporations and the way in which they have worked together to safeguard the treaty.

The meeting permitted definition of new spheres of action regarding the agreement signed in November 2003 to protect the native forest, which comprises about 500,000 hectares between both companies. One of the new tasks of logging companies will be the identification of areas and species of high conservational value in Nahuelbuta. This mountain range is a world-renowned treasure, in which there are still traces of ancient oak, monkey-puzzle, raulí and coigüe forests.

Both companies used this opportunity to present the findings of their studies on the destruction of the native forest. CMPC, which has been reclassifying their lands since 1996, started with 17,000 protected hectares and that figure has gone up to 130,000 to date. "We have gotten to know our native populations to the most minimal details,” the company said. On Arauco's side, studies cover Region VI through Region X, with over 270,000 hectares of native forest containing biological corridors intended for protection of endangered animal species such as woodpeckers and the elusive Darwin fox.