Jan 10, 2012. /Lesprom Network/. Vietnam has announced a crackdown on illegal logging in the country. The practice not only harms the environment as well as being a constant bugbear for authorities, it also affects the forestry and timber industries in Europe as well as further around the world, as KMS Baltics reported. Vietnam is the latest country to release plans to combat the practice with Asian neighbours Malaysia also drawing out their own plan of action to tackle the problem. Vietnam's forestry industry leader, Nguyen Huu Dung, said that over 32,000 hectares of woodland in Vietnam were lost every year due to the trend of illegal logging. He also added that in order to try and combat the trade, the Vietnamese forest management sector was to enforce tougher penalties in an attempt to prevent opportunistic traders from selling their illegally-sourced timber around the world.