NIAS, North Sumatra: The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has starting to supply timber to help speed up reconstruction work on Nias island, which was devastated by a massive earthquake in March last year.

The first shipment of 2,000 cubic meters of timber recently arrived in Nias, carried by a World Food Programme ship. Overall, the UNHCR will supply 15 cubic meters of timber to the North Sumatra island. "The timber was shipped from Kalimantan and the purchase was handled by the Medan office," said the head of UNHCR's Nias office, Reiko Hasegawa.

The timber will be used to build houses and other infrastructure. "The timber will be distributed for free to NGOs working in Nias to help the rebuilding process," said Rick Haughton, of the UNHCR.

He said the timber, which will be distributed to NGOs based on the quantity they requested, was legal and certified.

Slow reconstruction on the island was blamed partly on problems in obtaining legal timber as most of the timber readily available was allegedly derived from illegal logging. -- JP