‘Forest Carbon Finance: Potential and Challenges for Commonwealth Countries’ - addresses the potential of Sustainable Forest Management by Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation.
The potential and the challenges of Forest Carbon Finance
27 August 2008
First in a new series of discussion papers from the Commonwealth Secretariat examines ways to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation
The Commonwealth Secretariat has introduced a new series of Discussion Papers which aim to contribute to ongoing debates on a variety of topics and stimulate debate amongst experts.
The first paper – ‘Forest Carbon Finance: Potential and Challenges for Commonwealth Countries’ - addresses the potential of Sustainable Forest Management by Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD).
The paper explains that REDD is believed to offer the most benefits for forest mitigation through positive impacts on the environment, biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.
Carbon Finance
Carbon Finance is a general term used to describe investment in projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
It essentially involves developed countries paying developing countries to conserve their forests without losing economic gains from not using them for industrial development.
Deforestation currently contributes about one-fifth of all human-made emissions of carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas that leads to global warming and climate change. Because of this, the paper states that “preventing deforestation could therefore be highly significant in averting climate change”, adding that Commonwealth countries - many of which are developing countries - have over one-fifth of the world total forests, and therefore the potential to gain from the initiative.
The Discussion Paper was prepared by Dr Michael Richards of IDL Group Ltd with input from Alan Pottinger of the Commonwealth Forestry Association.
“Forests not only represent a massive source of stored carbon but their removal is one of the principal causes of global carbon dioxide emissions,” said Mr Pottinger.
What is REDD?
REDD is the mechanism promoted in the 2006 Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change presented in Kyoto. The Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Bali in December 2007, supported action on REDD.
“At present their importance in the global carbon economy is not recognised adequately. Moves to develop forest carbon finance schemes and include them in international agreements are being developed, but are complicated.”
He added: “The acute vulnerability of many Commonwealth countries to climate change means that they should support carbon finance initiatives as part of a package of measures supporting sustainable forest management which will ensure that forests are worth more standing than felled.”
Copies of the Paper are free and can be downloaded from www.thecommonwealth.org/forestcarbonfinance, where readers are encouraged to join the discussion by posting comments. At a later date, a selection of these comments will be available for viewing at the same site.
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