(Reuters) - A global market in forest carbon offsets under a U.N.-backed scheme will take three to seven years to develop in part because of the stalled U.S. climate bill, a top Indonesian forest investor said.

The United Nations says the scheme, called reduced emissions from  deforestation and degradation, or REDD, could be worth billions of dollars a year to developing nations, which would earn money from protecting and rehabilitating carbon-absorbing rainforests.

But the scheme hinges on rich nations putting in place mandatory emissions trading schemes that underpin demand for large volumes of internationally tradeable REDD credits. At present, REDD credits are sold in the unregulated voluntary market.

"No one will do anything until the U.S. comes to the table and I think that will happen in the second term, assuming Obama wins the election again in 2012," said Dharsono Hartono, president and director of Jakarta-based private company Rimba Makmur Utama.

His firm is the developer of a vast REDD pilot project in Indonesia's Central Kalimantan province.

Under REDD, credits would be bought by firms and governments of rich nations, which would use the offsets to partially meet mandatory emissions reduction targets.

A portion of the money would go to local forest communities in poorer nations to boost livelihoods.

The stalled U.S. climate bill has the potential to draw in hundreds of millions of offsets a year.

Hartono said there was growing skepticism Australia would pass a similar climate bill soon but that Japan could prove to be a major buyer through bilateral carbon offset deals.

REDD offsets could help Japanese companies meet the government's pledged emissions cut of 25 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels.

GREATER AWARENESS

"Best scenario, I think 2013," he told the Reuters Climate and Alternative Energy Summit on Monday, referring to demand from mandatory emissions trading markets in rich nations.

"I think the worst-case scenario (would be) 2017. By that time, the economy is getting better, people's awareness of climate change is much higher, there will be a lot of disasters between now and 2017 and people will say that's all because of climate change."

The United Nations is aiming to have an expanded form of REDD to be part of a new climate pact from 2013 and the shape of the scheme is already well advanced in the negotiations.

The world body predicts that financial flows for greenhouse gas emission reductions from the broader form of REDD, which incorporates sustainable management of forests, could reach up to US$30 billion a year.

Future pricing is still unclear but voluntary REDD credits sell in the forward market for between $3 and up to $10 each, representing a metric ton of carbon locked away, brokers say.

For the moment, demand for REDD credits has eased from two years ago when there was a much greater expectation of the U.S. climate bill passing the Senate, Hartono said.

"I think demand is still very limited. We have seen corporate buyers who aggressively approached us a few years ago are now less aggressive," he added, but still saw interest from banks.

Hartono and business partner Rezal Kusumaatmadja of consultancy Starling Resources have spent the past two years developing a project to save an area of pristine and degraded peat swamp forest in central Kalimantan.

The 227,000 hectare (560,900 acres) project is about three times the size of Singapore and will require the repair of drained peat canals and long-term replanting of areas damaged by illegal logging and mining. Engaging local communities was key.

"By doing REDD now, we can inform all stakeholders how things work on the ground," Hartono said, adding: "There is a risk if we came too early but, in the end, the risk of inaction is much greater."

REDD could also help drive greater regulatory reform in Indonesia through better and more transparent forestry management, he said, as well as large-scale REDD demonstration financing by other governments and agencies, such as the $1 billion REDD partnership between Norway and Indonesia announced earlier this year.(By David Fogarty and Sunanda Creagh; Editing by Ed Lane)

Source: Reuters

You may have seen Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, the Oscar-winning film on climate change. But have you watched Lakukan Sekarang Juga (Do It Now)?

This is a 21-minute documentary about climate change in Indonesia. The National Council on Climate Change (DNPI) released it in October 2009 to enhance public awareness of the issue.

Basically, it covers three matters: what climate change is about, what its impact is on nature and people and what the government and individuals can do.

The documentary starts in a feel-good manner with close-ups of cooing birds, butterflies fluttering over a bunch of flowers, a tiger wallowing in water, geese tramping together and young orangutans swinging from tree to tree.

A female voiceover asks: “Are you aware that our ability to enjoy these scenes is diminishing? These are the scenes that we will witness more often on a daily basis.” The camera then records scenes of a cracked and arid landscape, flooding in an urban settlement and a cyclone on a rampage.

Pak Subur, a caricature shirtless farmer wearing a conical straw hat, is shown lamenting over the hard rainfall that has inundated his rice field — not once but three times in a year.

He asks why this has happened. The narrator then explains that it has to do with global warming, which stems from greenhouse gas emissions that have raised the temperature of the earth’s surface and in turn caused weather and climate changes.

Climate change usually occurs due to changes in rainfall patterns, which in turn cause a shift in the seasons, according to the narrator. Dry seasons could be longer and more arid; wet seasons shorter and punctuated by intense rainfall that could bring flooding and erosion. The opposite, however, is also possible. Heavy rains could continue into the dry season, such as has happened throughout Indonesia this year, save for Bali and islands east of it.

The documentary continues with three fishermen in Java. The trio voice concerns over the shortened west monsoon winds, the greater distance their boats must travel and more fuel they must expend to catch fish and the high waves and intemperate seas they must brave to return with ever-diminishing catches.

To counter climate change, the film proposes a dual-track approach of adaptation and mitigation.

Adaptation is adjusting so as  to decrease the impact of climate change. Mitigation is action to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming.

The film also explains Indonesia’s efforts on the international stage. One such attempt was its introduction of the Bali Road Map at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, December 2007.

The Bali Road Map listed the steps governments should take to replace the Kyoto Protocol to reduce greenhouse gas emissions before it expires in 2012.

With an emphasis on mitigation, the documentary ends with a description of a range of actions individuals could take to minimize greenhouse gas emissions. These include efficient use of household appliances, recycling non-organic and organic waste, and using bikes to commute to work.

The DNPI has done a laudable job in producing the documentary. The film has pertinent and instructive information on climate change in Indonesia, but it focuses heavily on Java and has a masculine bias.  

The film’s three fishermen, two farmers and two bike-to-work advocates are all based in Java. Six of these seven interviewees were men. Women should have a say. Children, too, should have their voices heard as they own the nation’s future.  

A major climate change issue is greenhouse gas emissions caused by forest destruction. The film gave little detail on illegal logging and land use change, from peatlands to palm oil plantations, for instance. These are two major deforestation and degradation problems outside Java that factor in significantly in determining the size of Indonesia’s carbon footprint.

Indonesia’s program to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) received only passing mention. Yet the government is fleshing out a REDD+ initiative with additional objectives as part of a detailed national action plan on climate change it is preparing.  

Perhaps a second edition of Do It Now! (with an exclamation mark) could focus on deforestation in Sumatra, Kalimantan and Papua,  with their vast tropical rainforests, and how the REDD program could save them.

It could record their concerns and aspirations of women and children in forest communities.  

Such a film could help the public understand President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s declared ambition to curb Indonesia’s carbon emissions by 26 percent a by 2020. It could also illustrate how the REDD+ program could achieve that target.  

Indonesia’s annual carbon emissions were 2.1 gigatons (2.1 billion tons) in 2005 and were estimated to reach to 3.2 gigatons in 2030. Indonesia has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2.3 gigatons so that emissions in 2030 would be 67 percent lower than emissions in 2005, according to an August 2010 DNPI report, Indonesia’s Greenhouse Gas Abatement Cost Curve. This would be one big story for a film to tell.

Illegal logging and land use change factor in significantly in determining the size of Indonesia’s carbon footprint. (By Warief Djajanto Basorie)

The writer teaches journalism and has conducted workshops on development reporting at Dr. Soetomo Press Institute in Jakarta.

Source: The Jakarta Post

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According to a report released earlier this year, there has probably never been a more exciting time to be a tropical forest ecologist. With the emerging global forest carbon market alongside the growing interest in payments for ecosystem services, there is an immediate and unprecedented need for ecologists' expertise.

Forest carbon market frameworks, like the UN REDD+ initiative (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), depend on establishing historical baselines for land-use changes and drivers of deforestation, estimating carbon stocks and monitoring the response of forests over 10 to 20 year periods into the future.

The report - "How can ecologists help realise the potential of payments for carbon in tropical forest countries?" - was written by several authors, including Tim baker of the University of Leeds, and published in the Journal of Applied Ecology. Real world examples analysed in the study came mainly from the Peruvian Amazon, which contains 88% of that country's forest. Peru's forests are high in carbon content and face a variety of deforestation rates and threats. There are several REDD type projects already off the ground here and the new Ministry for Environment is about to implement a national programme for forest conservation which aims to collaborate with forest communities, including offering them payments for ecosystem services.

The knowledge that ecologists have about patterns of carbon stocks, biodiversity and the sensitivity of specific ecosystems to changing environmental, climatic and anthropogenic impacts is invaluable in informing the development of avoided deforestation projects within a forest carbon market. REDD+ projects, for example, need to have their carbon as well as social and economic data validated, verified and monitored periodically. Quantifying the changes in carbon stocks and assessing the permanence of project outcomes are issues that require an ecological perspective. The accurate assessment of leakage (negative impacts - like increased deforestation - outside of but related to the conservation project area) and also understanding the implications of a project for biodiversity management are also jobs which call for an ecologist as part of the team.

The single most important input from ecologists to global forest conservation is likely to be into the design of an effective and workable low-cost monitoring system for forest carbon stocks.

Sources: Cool Earth, Journal of Applied Ecology (British Ecological Society)

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The progress of climate talks in China, the last formal gathering before a global summit due to begin next month, was “very patchy and much too slow,” a senior European Union official said.

“The gap between the texts on the table at the end of the Tianjin session and the decisions we need to reach in Cancun is still very big,” EU Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. “A lot of work will be needed over the coming weeks to bridge this gap.”

The United Nations conference in Cancun, Mexico, which starts on Nov. 29, should “result in a balanced package of decisions” aimed at fighting climate change, Hedegaard said.

The 27-nation EU wants to be a leader in the fight against global warming. It is on schedule to meet its 2020 goal of cutting greenhouse gases by 20 percent from 1990 levels and has said it’s ready to move to 30 percent if other countries follow suit.

It stopped short of setting a more ambitious goal at a global climate summit in Copenhagen last year, citing a lack of comparable effort by the U.S. and China.

In Copenhagen, negotiators failed to reach a binding deal setting a framework for greenhouse-gas reduction for when the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012. Instead, they settled for a political accord calling for $100 billion a year by 2020 in climate financing for poor nations. They also vowed to stop global temperature increases at 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than pre-industrial times.

Climate Finance

The talks in Tianjin, which ended yesterday, brought some progress on climate finance, technology cooperation, tropical deforestation and adaptation to climate change, Hedegaard said.

Still, there has been “insufficient progress in translating key elements of the Copenhagen Accord into UN texts,” she said. “The lack of progress on these issues, and signs of backtracking on the Copenhagen Accord by certain parties, gives us cause for concern about the balance of the Cancun package.”

Hedegaard said the EU will strive to help ensure the summit in Mexico has a positive outcome and becomes a basis for an “ambitious” and legally binding climate agreement “as soon as possible.” (By Ewa Krukowska)

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Source: Bloomberg

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