Forest issues have taken the stage in the ongoing climate change talks in Cancun, Mexico. The conference is expected to develop an agreement on REDD (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation) that will become the legal basis for forested nations to implement the plan for emission reductions in order to mitigate global warming. The Jakarta Post’s Adianto P. Simamora interviewed Brazil’s lead negotiator for REDD affairs, Thelma Krug, on what Brazil, the nation with the world’s largest rainforest, has done to prepare for the implementation of REDD. Below is an excerpt.

Question: What is the status of REDD-plus pilot projects in Brazil?

Answer: We are still creating a national strategy for REDD, which means we are developing what could constitute an institutional arrangement, with broad participation by civil society, business people and indigenous people. We want their voices heard.

We have also discussed the distribution of financial benefits and learned about the implications and difficulties. We here in Brazil have discussed how the plan can become a comprehensive mechanism that could be adapted to Brazil.

Even if the Cancun talks come up with REDD rules, Brazil wants to have its own regulations that would fit into regulations made in multilateral agreements, but would also make specifications for the country.

In benefit sharing, we don’t know exactly how it would be distributed. We don’t have clear idea yet. We are still thinking about that carefully, with the participation of civil society, locals and indigenous groups.

We expect the benefits should be part of resources that need to implement monitoring tools for the verification of emissions cuts.

Some state governments in Brazil have been discussing benefit sharing within their own states, but this would only apply in their respective areas, not to all of Brazil.

In Brazil, we also don’t call them REDD pilot projects. They are “self-labored” REDD projects because the federal government has not formally recognized the pilot project yet.

What would be your strategy for REDD implementation?

Brazil doesn’t see REDD being implemented through project-based mechanisms because we think REDD is a mechanism related to forms of more sustainable development change. The project-based approach would not lead us to that.

With project-based mechanisms, we can have a project here and another project somewhere else, but they would never make up a picture of REDD at the national level. What is necessary in Brazil’s vision is to have a national framework based on a national approach, so we know exactly where we want to go and how to get there.

The national approach to forests is necessary in order to provide ideas on how to get to REDD’s objective to maintain carbon stocks in forests and reduce emissions from deforestation.

Could you explain a little bit about the Amazon Fund?

The Amazon is the largest forest in Brazil. But it has not been developed through a national approach. The Amazon Fund was coordinated by the Development Bank of Brazil, not the federal government.

The deforestation rate in the Amazon continues to decrease. It is currently at 6,000 kilometers compared to more than 20,000 kilometers five years ago.

This reflects federal government policies like a tight monitoring system, fiscal policies and law enforcement.

We are now expanding the monitoring system to other forests in Brazil.

One condition that Brazil demands of donors providing money to the Amazon Fund is that their projects never generate certified emission reductions or any carbon trading.

We have made it clear since the beginning that all money given to the Amazon Fund should be voluntary contributions. So, there is absolutely no offsetting with any carbon reduction achieved through the Amazon Fund.

The government of Norway has promised US$1 billion to the Amazon Fund, but Norway can’t use it to offset its emissions.

Brazil has sovereignty to use the money from the fund, as the fund should be guided by several committees that have been put in place that involve the participation of civil society, NGOs, academics and researchers. They provide guidance as to how the money should be used.

Could you explain the latest progress of REDD in the group of G77?

We have had very little opportunity for success here, but I think the proposal of the chair on REDD must be very good.

We don’t want that (other sector) to benefit from the mechanism. We have to propose another carbon strategy for other sectors such as the energy, waste and industry sectors. We want REDD-plus to be about forest issues.

Source: The Jakarta Post

Copyright © 2008 The Jakarta Post - PT Bina Media Tenggara. All Rights Reserved.

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(Reuters) - Saying the health of the planet is at stake, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged 190 nations meeting in Mexico on Tuesday to agree to steps to fight climate change that fall short of a perfect deal.

"We cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good," Ban told a first session of environment ministers at the November 29 to December 10 talks in the Caribbean resort of Cancun where rich and poor nations are split over cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

After U.S. President Barack Obama and other leaders failed to work out a U.N. climate treaty at a 2009 summit in Copenhagen, Ban repeatedly stressed lower ambitions for the Cancun talks despite calls by some nations for radical action.

Ban told the ministers: "the stability of the global economy, the well-being of your citizens, the health of our planet, all this and more depend on you."

The Cancun talks are seeking a package deal to set up a fund to oversee climate aid, ways to slow deforestation, steps to help poor countries adapt to climate change and a mechanism to share clean technologies such as wind and solar power.

Some developing nations, with Bolivia the most outspoken, have said that far more radical action by the rich is needed now to cut greenhouse gas emissions and deadly floods, droughts, desertification and rising sea levels.

Speaking on behalf of Africa, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said he was "deeply dismayed" by the loss of momentum since Copenhagen. "Every day of delay is being paid for by the lives of countless numbers of Africans," he said.

CHINA, INDIA

About 1,500 people marched in Cancun in protest the low ambitions of the talks and dumped buckets of animal excrement in the street. Overnight, some protesters threw eggs at riot police and defaced a fast-food restaurant.

Developed and developing countries are most split about the future of the U.N.'s 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which obliges almost 40 rich nations to cut emissions by an average of 5.2 percent below 1990 levels in the five-year period 2008-12.

"The Kyoto Protocol issue continues to be very tough. It's not clear whether it's resolvable," U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern told a news conference. He said that the Kyoto dispute was distracting time from other parts of the negotiations.

The United States is the only rich nation outside of the Kyoto Protocol after arguing that treaty wrongly omitted targets for 2012 for developing nations and would cause U.S. jobs losses. The U.S. absence is a core part of the problem in designing a new deal.

Japan, Russia and Canada have been adamant that they will not approve an extension to Kyoto when the first period runs out in 2012. They want a new, broader treaty that will also bind the United States and emerging powers like China and India to act.

Asked if Japan might ever agree to extend Kyoto, Akira Yamada of Japan's foreign ministry told Reuters: "Yes. If U.S., China and other major emitters become Annex One countries." Annex One lists rich nations bound by Kyoto.

Many rich countries, suffering weak growth and budget cuts, want emerging economies led by fast-growing China and India to do far more to reflect their growing power, including greater oversight of their curbs on greenhouse gas emissions.

Developing states say rich nations have emitted most greenhouse gases since the Industrial Revolution and must extend Kyoto before poor countries sign up for action. Kyoto underpins carbon markets guiding a shift away from fossil fuels.

Christiana Figueres, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, said positions were "diametrically opposed" and the future of Kyoto was not due to be decided in Cancun.

"Germans have a wonderful word 'yein' which means both 'yes' and 'no' and I think that's the kind of attitude countries are now engaged in," she said.

A U.N. report showed that residents of the Himalayas and other mountain areas face a tough and unpredictable future as global warming melts glaciers and threatens worse floods.

(By Russell Blinch and Christopher Buckley; Writing by Alister Doyle, editing by Christopher Wilson and Philip Barbara)

Source: Reuters

© Copyright 2010 Thomson Reuters

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Can rich nations pay a corruption-riddled government to protect its rainforests?

On a humid afternoon in Sungai Tohor, a coastal village in Sumatra's Riau province, 50 or so men are packed into a town-hall conference room. They sit in neat rows of blue plastic chairs, many clad in knee-high rubber boots, loose-fitting polo shirts, and baggy pants—the casual uniform of an Indonesian farmer. Women and children peer in through open windows and doors. There's excitement in the air, thanks to a gaggle of visiting journalists and enviros who have come to discuss the fate of the village—and a way of life now under siege.

Over multiple generations, residents of Sungai Tohor have built a thriving trade network that has brought them relative prosperity. Each month, they ship several hundred tons of sago paste—a starchy dietary staple produced from trees they cultivate in the jungle—to Malaysia and Java. The proceeds have enabled them to buy bright new motorbikes, build quaint homes, and maintain a slow-paced lifestyle that prioritizes family and community above all else. Some families can even send their children to college.

Last year, however, Indonesia's Ministry of Forestry told PT LUM—a supplier for the Singapore-based pulp-and-paper giant APRIL—that it could cut down nearly 26,000 acres of lush rainforest surrounding Sungai Tohor and replace it with acacia trees, used to make paper products. The proposed plantation overlaps with the sago groves and other areas that the villagers use to grow rubber and coconuts.

Among the town-hall speakers is Kaka, a slender, ponytailed man who works as an organizer for the Indonesian environmental group WALHI. As he explains it, Indonesia is accepting cash from Western governments to protect its rainforests even as it enables outside corporations to destroy them. Back in May, in exchange for $1 billion from Norway, Indonesia's president agreed to place a two-year moratorium on new logging permits. In theory, his administration is also supposed to work closely with locals to develop sustainable forestry practices—such as Sungai Tohor's sago trade. But government officials have yet to address the villagers' formal complaints.

The Norway deal is part of a broader United Nations program with an insufferably wonky title—Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation—that aims to tackle climate change by paying developing countries to preserve their forests. Because the destruction of rainforests and their carbon-rich peat soils releases vast quantities of CO2 into the atmosphere, and because the payoffs seem like a relatively cheap and straightforward fix, REDD is likely to be one of the hottest negotiation items at the current round of climate talks in Cancun, Mexico. Among the major sticking points: What, exactly, constitutes a forest? (Logging interests argue that their plantations should qualify.) And how much say will forest communities like Sungai Tohor have in the process?

Back at the town hall, Nong, a gregarious sago mill owner, stands to speak his piece. "If this company comes in," he says, "the sago groves will be destroyed and we will lose our way of life. Soon they will clear the trees and plant acacia. We will then lose the animals—the deer, the pigs." He looks over at the foreigners. "We ask you to help us to keep our village, our food supply, our livelihoods." He takes his seat amid murmurs of agreement and nodding heads.

The village secretary rises in turn to remind everyone what happened in 2003, when PT LUM received a similar logging concession nearby. The residents "rejected them in a harsh way," vandalizing equipment and setting up security camps to protect areas they claimed as their own. When the government sent in troops to assist the company, the men grew infuriated. They marched to the house of their kepala desa (chief)—who had taken the company's side—and burned it to the ground.

The new kepala desa stands with the villagers.

Indonesia is an attractive target for international climate-change efforts, because it boasts the third-largest expanse of tropical rainforest on the planet, and one of the most biodiverse—its emerald-green jungles are home to iconic endangered mammals like Sumatran tigers, elephants, rhinos, and orangutans. Some 30 million Indonesians also rely on the forests for subsistence, taking wood to build homes and boats, and animals to eat.

More to the point, Indonesia is the world's third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, second only to the United States and China. The overwhelming majority—85 percent—of those emissions result directly from the conversion of jungle to agriculture. Since 1990, companies like APRIL and Sinar Mas have cleared nearly 91,000 square miles of mature Indonesian rainforest—an area larger than Minnesota—and planted acacia and a variety of palm whose oil is used in everything from breakfast cereals to cosmetics to biofuels.

Worldwide, this sort of land conversion generates more greenhouse gases than the entire global transportation sector, which is why wealthy nations, including the United States, are now handing over cash to curb the destruction. Much of the $4.5 billion pledged thus far is destined for Indonesia, where President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (Indonesians call him "SBY") has vowed to cut overall emissions 26 percent by 2020—or more, provided the cash keeps coming.

That, however, would constitute a complete turnaround in Indonesia's forest policy. For one thing, SBY recently pledged to increase acacia and palm-oil production even while curbing deforestation, a seemingly contradictory goal; for another, the government has for decades handed out huge logging concessions to firms with close ties to "the military and state elites," says Christopher Barr, a forest policy expert with the U.S.-based consulting firm Woods & Wayside International. He adds that "corruption is widespread at all levels within the sector," and powerful interests "have often displaced rural communities that have managed these resources for generations."

Following the town-hall meeting, I'm whisked away on the back of a moped along a narrow, cracking concrete path—what passes for a road in these parts. I dismount in front of a single-story wood home where I've arranged to chat privately with Kaka and Alfian, the current kepala desa. Or not so privately, as it turns out: Alfian's living room is like an auxiliary town hall, with dozens of villagers coming and going during our conversation—rushing to greet their chief with handshakes and smiles. Alfian, clad in a plaid shirt and neat black slacks, returns the good will, offering each man his hand and attentive gaze.

Even before Kaka got involved, Sungai Tohor had partnered with other villages under threat from paper companies and collected 30,000 signatures on a petition protesting the concessions—which WALHI helped distribute to regional and federal officials. He hands over a thick stack of paper that includes the signatures, along with arguments detailing why the concessions are illegal and how they will destroy the local economy.

Some 60 percent of the targeted area, Kaka explains, is by law the villagers' customary land. In addition to the sago areas, he says, PT LUM is preparing to clear areas of untouched rainforest that the company and the ministry falsely claim are "degraded." (In a new report, Greenpeace warns of precisely such a ploy by paper and palm oil interests aiming to expand by rebranding their activities as land "rehabilitation.") Already the company has cut a clearing just outside the village boundary, where it has dug several 20-foot-wide canals through the thick peat soils—another legal violation, he adds.

The canals, Kaka explains, are meant to drain the peat—acacias prefer dry soil—and to create a waterway that can be used to transport cut trees to the pulping mill. As the soil dries, so too will the sago trees, which thrive in the moist soil. "There's already a drop in the water table," Alfian says, based on his last excursion into the forest.

Kaka and Alfian suspect that PT LUM bribed government officials to secure the concession—this, they believe, is why the Ministry of Forestry has yet to review their petition. I ask the men whether, in the absence of a federal review of the permits, the villagers are prepared to confront the company as they did back in 2003. They turn toward one another, eyes wide. "We're going to try to make sure that doesn't happen," Alfian responds. "We don't want to use anarchistic or violent methods. We want to use democratic means."

After leaving Alfian's, I go visit some sago mills on the village outskirts, where man-made structures give way to a lush wall of Sumatran rainforest. The harvested logs are floated here from deep in the forest by way of a slow-moving river that runs adjacent to the row of mills.

I watch a man strip dry brown bark from the logs with slow, deliberate heaves of an ax. Another worker, a cigarette dangling from his lips, chops the stripped logs into wedges, which are then fed into a pulping machine—its motor chuffing like a riverboat stuck in mud. The pulpy ivory-colored mass pours out of a rubber hose at the base of the machine and into a long rectangular pool where the starch is separated from the wood fibers. Next to the bath, dozens of sacks of sago paste stand upright and ready to ship. Surrounding each mill are piles of bark to be burned for fuel or used to make floors or fences.

Over at his mill, Nong, who is 66 but could pass for mid-40s, becomes animated when he talks about the setup. Rather than simply harvesting logs for prosperous mill owners, the farmers grow, process, and sell the paste themselves—paying mill owners a small sum for use of their machinery. "That way," Nong says, "even families with only a few logs are still able to produce their own sago."

Now that their economy is under threat, villagers are warily looking to the Norway pact for a strategic opening. The petition Kaka showed me plays up the role of forests and peatlands in mitigating climate change, and some farmers told me they were developing proposals for how REDD funds could be used to improve sago production. "We will support the government's program," Alfian explains, "but only if it goes to saving the forests."

That remains to be seen, of course. In late October, Wandojo Siswanto, formerly a top climate-change negotiator and architect of the Norway pact, was arrested and charged with accepting a $10,000 bribe to grant a company's no-bid contract with the forest ministry. Siswanto told reporters that he was simply obeying ministry orders, a claim the government denied.

The buck now stops with Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, an SBY confidant whom the president has put in charge of implementing the Norway deal. Kuntoro enjoys a clean reputation, having supervised a $7 billion donor fund as head of post-tsunami reconstruction in hard-hit Aceh province. "We are now fighting very hard to have a country with high integrity," Kuntoro told me. With "REDD and reconstruction in Aceh, we've proven that when it comes to starting from zero, we can design something different than what we had before."

His definition of success is simple: lower emissions. But when I asked whether the government would reconsider concessions such as the one near Sungai Tohor, Kuntoro turned vague. "It all depends on where the concession is," he said. "We are going to limit development on peat land; there are a number of factors that we have to consider before making a decision to review or not to review." He would not elaborate.

PT LUM has yet to start clearing around Sungai Tohor in earnest. But unless the government does step in, there's nothing to stop it from doing so. The company has doled out work to villagers here and there, but nothing that would make up for loss of their sago. Standing in the clearing alongside one of PT LUM's canals, farmer Numun Daya grips his machete. "It was 1903 that my ancestors first opened land here. When I think of that time, I think of the hardship for them," he says. "We have lost 13 areas of sago, and there is only a tiny bit of work from the logging company. We still have six more sago areas in danger.

"With those fields," the farmer adds, "we have a future." (By Robert Eshelman)

This piece was reported as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The writer also received support from the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute.

Source: Slate

© Copyright 2010 Washington Post.Newsweek Interactive Co. LLC

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A global deal to save rainforests, backed by the Prince of Wales, is hanging in the balance at the Cancun climate change talks as countries struggle to agree on how to stop deforestation.

Protecting forests was supposed to be a major part of any deal to tackle global warming.

Prince Charles and others suggested a new fund should be set up that allows rich countries to pay poor nations not to chop down trees.

Under certain models the scheme would create a whole new financial market where countries, companies and even individuals can pay to offset their carbon by planting a tree.

However the complicated plan is in danger of being dropped because certain countries refuse to accept the idea of making a tree a 'commodity'. They also fear rich countries will use the mechanism as an excuse for producing more carbon as long as they can ‘offset’ it through protecting trees.

Other nations are understood to be blocking progress as a negotiating tactic to get what they want in other areas of the talks.

Also there are concerns about the rights of indigenous people and corrupt governments in places like the Congo.

The scheme known as Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation or REDD will be a key part of any global deal on climate change.

And if progress is not made on the issue in Cancun it will be a severe embarrassment to the United Nations talks.

Chris Huhne, the UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary, said progress on REDD is vital.

“Success in cutting carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation will not just be a vital part of the fight against climate change; it will also be an important marker of success for the UN process itself,” he said.

Some 13 million hectares (50,000 square miles) of forest are cut down each year – the equivalent of the size of England – to provide timber or make way for grazing land.

Because trees absorb carbon this causes around 20 per cent of man made carbon emission every year.

Campaigners want deforestation to be halved by 2020 and to stop completely by 2030.

But at the moment there are no such targets on the table.

Developed nations have pledged some £2.8 ($4.5) billion towards REDD already but the money is slow in coming through and many claim it is not enough.

Campaigners say it will cost £19 ($30) billion every year to halt deforestation.

Pablo Salon, Bolivia’s chief negotiator, said the money should come mostly from public funds and insist on the rights of indigenous people.

He said it is dangerous to use the market to protect nature when it is unstable and uncaring.

“They talk about reducing emissions but not in a comprehensive measure including the rights of indigenous people,” he said. “We do need a forest mechanism but it needs to be comprehensive. It is to preserve forests not to assess them in monetary terms for a carbon market.”

To move forward the UN process needs consensus and it is rumoured Saudi Arabia is also blocking progress in order to force compromise on other issues, even though it has few forests.

Another issue that has to be worked out before the end of the week are methods of reporting and verification to check whether forests are being protected once payment is given. Larger forest nations like Brazil are cautious in this area while many developed nations worry about corruption.

Also the question of whether whole countries should be paid to reduce deforestation or individual projects should be get money, prompting fears that will just shift the problem elsewhere.

Finally there is risk that the deal will be damaged by a protest vote from poor nations who are increasingly frustrated that the rich world refuses to report their own levels of deforestation.

Mr Huhne insisted progress could be made towards a more comprehensive deal next year.

“This week, we can agree on the principles of REDD+, the scale at which it should operate, and the range of forest activities covered. We can also agree on safeguards for people and biodiversity, and set in train work programmes to inform discussions on setting reference levels and MRV (monitoring, reporting and verification).

“Over the course of the next year, we need a better assessment and clearer agreement on the levels of medium and longer-term finance needed for forests,” he said. (By Louise Gray)

Source: The Telegraph

© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2010