Adianto P. Simamora, Bali – Indonesia admitted that law enforcement on illegal logging activities remained poor since most of the jailed violators were low-ranking staff, punished with less than two years in prison.

The Ministry of Forestry said that of the 597 people sent to jail for illegal logging activities in the last two years, as many as 326 people were sentenced to less than a year, and another 128 got less than two years.

"About 76 percent of the people sent to prison are still from lowest level, like drivers," Puspa Dewi Liman, deputy director for the program and evaluation of investigation and forest protection at the ministry said in a forest conference in Bali. "We are not happy with the results", she said Friday.

The Indonesian government has long been under pressure to tackle illegal logging which leads to high deforestation, causing the loss of more that one million hectares of forest per year.

Forestry Minister MS Kaban told the conference on Thursday that illegal logging cases had dropped significantly in the last four years under his term.

The World Bank said that illegal logging in Indonesia caused between US$10 billion (Rp 100 trillion) and $15 billion in lost revenue to the government in 2006.