Publications

Forests and Climate Change: adaptation and mitigation

Climate change is generally recognized as one of the greatest challenges of this century. Forests contain a substantial part of the planet’s carbon; therefore, current rates of forest loss contribute to almost 20 percent of total emissions of carbon dioxide. Climate change and forests are intrinsically linked: climate change is a threat to forests, and protecting forests from conversion and degradation helps mitigate the impacts of climate change. To address climate change, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was established at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. It was followed in 1997 by the more powerful and legally binding Kyoto Protocol. The protocol recognizes that developed countries share the main responsibility for the current high levels of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere, and places a heavier burden on them under the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities.” Under this protocol industrialized countries are allowed to meet part of their emission reduction targets abroad through so-called ”market-based mechanisms,” such as the Clean Development Mechanism. The first Kyoto commitment period ends in 2012. At the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen in December 2009 (COP 15) countries are expected to concur on a new agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol in 2012. One of the challenges in Copenhagen will be to engage developing countries in reducing their emissions and adapting to the impacts of climate change. In 2007 an Action Plan was agreed to in Bali, including a mechanism for reducing emissions from avoided deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). In the run-up to Copenhagen the challenge is to guarantee that the new protocol will be effective and efficient in terms of carbon reduction, and at the same time equitable and non-detrimental to the Earth’s biodiversity. REDD could become a centrepiece for the financing of forestry reform after 2012. How to put this mechanism into practice after Copenhagen will be a challenge, however. Objectives for climate change mitigation and adaptation need to be integrated with sustainable forest management and biodiversity protection, and at the same time must allow for the improved welfare of rural people in developing countries. With this issue of ETFRN News, containing more than 20 wide-ranging articles on forests and climate change, we wish to contribute to the discussion on the potential role of forests and forest management in mitigating and adapting to climate change.

Financing Sustainable Forest Management

In recent years the question of broadening and diversifying the financial basis for forest management has emerged as a key theme in the international forest policy dialogue. Everywhere in the world, policy-makers, researchers and practitioners are taking steps to develop new ways of paying for the goods and services provided by forests. Most recently, within the context of the 7th meeting of the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF-7), the international community adopted a “Non-Legally Binding Instrument” for all types of forests. This instrument expresses a shared understanding that sustainable development policies must be supported by a broad array of financial resources from national, international, public and private sources, in the context of a strengthened enabling policy environment for forest-related governance and management. Like UNFF, other intergovernmental forest-related instruments — such as the Convention on Biodiversity, the Climate Change Convention, the Convention to Combat Desertification and the International Tropical Timber Organization — have marked sustainable financing of ecosystem management as a key topic. During the next meeting (UNFF-8, in April 2009), an international financing mechanism or framework will be proposed based on the so-called “Portfolio Approach” to support the national and international implementation of sustainable forest management. The “Paramaribo Dialogue: a Country-Led Initiative on Financing for Sustainable Forest Management, in Support of the United Nations Forum on Forests,” that will be held September 8–12, 2008 in Paramaribo, Suriname, will be an important milestone on the path to the elaboration of these proposed mechanisms. This issue of ETFRN News on Financing Sustainable Forest Management brings together more than 35 articles on a variety of current policy and implementation initiatives at the international, national and local levels in this field, as well as views and experiences from experts and case studies of financial mechanisms for sustainable forest management. This newsletter would not have been possible without the contributions of the authors. Jani Holopainen, Tapani Oksanen, Jyrki Salmi and Anna-Leena Simula from Indufor Oy are acknowledged for collecting and editing the articles. Moreover, I would like to extend my gratitude to Kees van Dijk (Tropenbos International) and Herman Savenije (Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality) for taking the initiative for this ETFRN News. Their expertise in and dedication to the subject has brought the publication to fruition and guaranteed the quality of the articles. Adequate financing for sustainable forest management is directly linked to broader development objectives like poverty alleviation, access to safe drinking water, climate change mitigation and the protection and management of the natural resource base for economic and social development. With this publication we hope to take a step towards realising these goals.

Forests and the Millennium Development Goals