New report underlines multiple benefits, new challenges to biodiversity-rich sites

Deforestation in the Usambara Mountains in Lushoto District, Tanga Region, Tanzania.Photo:Mohsin S. Karmali/WikimediaAn agreement in Copenhagen to fund reduced emissions from deforestation may generate multiple environmental and economic benefits if investments simultaneously target sites that are both carbon and biodiversity-rich.

But the new report, published in the journal Conservation Letters, also warns of challenges in countries such as Brazil and parts of East Africa unless safeguards are followed. This is because funding Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) might also displace and intensify activities such as agriculture in lower carbon but equally biodiversity-rich locales. Such areas include parts of East Africa and Brazil.

The end of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon?

Photo: Phil P.Harris/WikimediaA new article in the December 4 issue of Science addresses how the combined efforts of government commitments and market transition could save forest and reduce carbon emissions in Brazil.

The Policy Forum brief, entitled "The End of Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon" was authored by contributors from the Woods Hole Research Centre, Instituto de Pesquisa Ambiental da Amazonia (IPAM), Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Aliança da Terra, Environmental Defence Fund, University of Florida, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, and the Universidade Federal do Pará.

Clicks to help save Amazon

Those people unable to make it to the Copenhagen Climate Conference this month can still contribute to stopping climate change – by using a new search engine from their own computers.

The same day the conference begins on Dec. 7, web users can start using a new green search engine called Ecosia. The new application, powered by Yahoo! and Microsoft's Bing search engines, will allow internet surfers to protect about 2 square meters of Amazon rainforest just by clicking on sponsored links.

Study finds logging effects vary based on a forest's history, climate

A Smoky Mountain forest's woodland herb population has shown that climate may play a role in how forest under-stories recover from logging, according to Purdue University research.

Despite heavy logging in portions of the forest nearly 80 years ago, the distribution of trillium plants on the secondary forest floor was similar to that of undisturbed areas. Michael Jenkins, a Purdue assistant professor of forestry and natural resources, said that contrasts with a study by other researchers of an Oregon forest in which trillium didn't recover after logging.

UNESCO biosphere bulldozed by Brazilian ranchers

A Totobiegosode man making string.Photo:SurvivalA UNESCO Biosphere Reserve inhabited by an uncontacted tribe is being bulldozed by Brazilian cattle ranchers at a devastating rate.

A government representative and two relatives of the tribe have tried to enter the region, but personnel from the ranchers' company, Yaguarete Pora S.A, barred them.The reserve, in the Chaco region in Paraguay, is home to the only uncontacted tribe in South America outside of the Amazon, the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode.

Bulldozers advance in Paraguayan Chaco

If deforestation continues, the Paraguayan Chaco will soon be reduced to isolated fragments.Photo:Guyra ParaguayBirdLife Partner Guyra Paraguay has warned that if current rates of deforestation continue, the Chaco, currently home to rich and abundant biodiversity, could soon be reduced to the same state as South America's Atlantic Forest: isolated fragments providing a tenuous clawhold for the threatened remnants of its bird species.

Satellite images analysed by Guyra Paraguay shows that habitat losses in 2009 will be far higher than in 2008, when 228,000 ha were bulldozed to make way for agriculture, mainly cattle ranching.

Billion hectares of forests with potential for restoration

Land areas around the world, bigger than Canada, have been identified as having potential to be restored to good quality, healthy forests, a new study has found.

As the global effort to help tackle climate change by reversing the earth's alarming loss of forests steps up, scientists using sophisticated satellite mapping have produced a world map identifying areas in which more than a billion hectares of former forest land and degraded forest land has restoration potential.

Paper factory shut down sends warning signal to world leaders

Greenpeace shuts down climate destroyer in Indonesian rainforest ahead of critical UN summit

Twelve days before the critical UN Copenhagen Climate Summit, today Greenpeace activists shut down the export facilities of a major pulp and paper mill operated by Asia Pulp and Paper (APP) in the heart of Indonesia's rainforests. Sinar Mas, which owns APP, is a leading driver of global climate change due to its widespread role in forest destruction.

Super volcano eruption – in Sumatra – deforested India 73,000 years ago

Illustration of what the eruption might have looked like from approximately 80 km above Pulau Simeulue.A new study provides "incontrovertible evidence" that the volcanic super-eruption of Toba on the island of Sumatra about 73,000 years ago deforested much of central India, some 3,000 miles from the epicentre, researchers report.

The volcano ejected an estimated 800 cubic kilometres of ash into the atmosphere, leaving a crater (now the world's largest volcanic lake) that is 100 kilometres long and 35 kilometres wide. Ash from the event has been found in India, the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal and the South China Sea.

Brazil sets example on halting forest loss

The recent announcement by Brazil – one of the world's top emitters of greenhouse gases from deforestation - that it is adopting new emissions reduction targets could help steer negotiators in Copenhagen toward a stronger climate change deal.

Brazil's top environment ministers said late last week the country is committing to an emission reduction target of between 36.1 and 38.9 percent by 2020. Brazil announced those figures only a day after saying new data showed the lowest deforestation rates in the Amazon in the past 21 years.

The potential ecological costs and co-benefits of REDD

A new paper just published in Global Change Biology examines the potential of a REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) mechanism to provoke ecological damage and/or promote ecological co-benefits.

Such analysis is key as negotiations and discussions continue between now and early December when the United Nation's Framework Convention on Climate Change holds its 15th Conference of the Parties, where an agreement on REDD may emerge.

"Get your oil company out of our protected areas"

Amazon Rainforest, seen from the Alto Madre de Dios river, in Peru.Photo:Martin St-Amant /WikipediaAs deadline approaches, tensions rise again in the Peruvian Amazon

In a recent open letter to Hunt Oil Company President Ray Hunt, the Native Federation of the Río Madre de Dios (FENAMAD) gave Hunt until this week to leave the Amarakaeri Communal Reserve in the southern Peruvian Amazon as a condition to continuing any further talks with the indigenous communities living in the Reserve area.

A ghostly shadow falls on London's Trafalgar Square

Photo:FFIGhost Forest launched recently to highlight the connection between deforestation and climate change.

Ghost Forest, an original and ambitious art installation by Angela Palmer, is a collection of rainforest tree stumps from regulated, commercially logged tropical rainforests of Ghana. Dramatically placed around Trafalgar Square the negative space where the trees once stood sends a powerful message for climate change – the removal of the Earth's lungs will have a catastrophic effect.

Falling Amazon deforestation helps in saving other forests

View of Amazon basin forest north of Manaus, Brazil. Photo: Phil P. Harris/WikimediaFewer trees were cut down in the Amazon this year, creating an opportunity to apply sound government policies to halt deforestation in other damaged forests, WWF says.

Data released recently by the Brazilian government shows that the deforestation rate in the Amazon fell between August 2008 and July 2009. Overall, the deforested region is a 45 per cent smaller than Amazon land cleared the previous year, or between August 2007 and July 2008.

This is the lowest rate of deforestation in the Amazon since record-keeping began in 2000, and down from a high of more than 27,000 square kms in 2004.

However, the Amazon did lose 7,008 square kms of forest this year, according to government officials and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who attended a ceremony Thursday to announce this year’s deforestation figures.

According to Denise Hamú, WWF-Brazil's CEO, although it is essential to recognise the efforts made by the federal and state governments as well as Brazilian society in general, further action is required.

"Deforestation needs to continue falling in a sustainable manner and must take place in other Brazilian biomes in addition to the Amazon, such as the Cerrado", she stated.

Hamú also said that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, to be held in Copenhagen in December, will be a good opportunity for Brazil to defend the adoption of clear and ambitious emission reduction commitments by the participant countries.

"Deforestation numbers such as the ones showed today by President Lula strengthen Brazil's credentials to lead the climate negotiations and take the forefront in building a new development model for the world that respects the environment and the people", Hamú said.

Among the other biomes, the most critical situation is found in the Cerrado. While deforestation in the Amazon has finally fallen below 10,000 km2, in the Cerrado it surpasses 20,000 km2.

Despite conservation efforts, global deforestation continues at an alarming rate – 13 million hectares per year, or 36 football fields a minute. It generates almost 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and halting forest loss has been identified as one of the most cost-effective ways to keep the world out of the danger zone of runaway climate change.

According to Cláudio Maretti, WWF-Brazil's Conservation Director, apart from decreasing emissions caused by deforestation in the Amazon the country needs to work on achieving reductions in the industry and transport sectors, and especially in energy generation and transmission processes.

"After all, the planet urgently needs expressive greenhouse gas emission reductions", he said.

Positive efforts made by the Brazilian government that should be applied in other areas include: Creating and implementing protected areas, promoting sustainable forest management, restricting public credit for land grabbers and deforesters, and promoting land tenure regularisation actions. Also important are efforts to minimise the impacts of large-scale infrastructure projects such as roads and dams.

In addition, Maretti said it is essential to implement a consistent payment mechanism for ecological services - which consists in compensating producers who conserve the standing forest.

Reducing greenhouse gases may not be enough to slow climate change

The expanding Los Angeles metropolitan area is an early example of un-controlled urbanisation. Photo: Thomas Pintaric/WikimediaGeorgia Tech City and Regional Planning Professor Brian Stone publishes a paper in the December edition of Environmental Science and Technology that suggests policymakers need to address the influence of global deforestation and urbanisation on climate change, in addition to greenhouse gas emissions.

According to Stone's paper, as the international community meets in Copenhagen in December to develop a new framework for responding to climate change, policymakers need to give serious consideration to broadening the range of management strategies beyond greenhouse gas reductions alone.

"Across the U.S. as a whole, approximately 50 per cent of the warming that has occurred since 1950 is due to land use changes (usually in the form of clearing forest for crops or cities) rather than to the emission of greenhouse gases," said Stone. "Most large U.S. cities, including Atlanta, are warming at more than twice the rate of the planet as a whole – a rate that is mostly attributable to land use change. As a result, emissions reduction programs – like the cap and trade program under consideration by the U.S. Congress – may not sufficiently slow climate change in large cities where most people live and where land use change is the dominant driver of warming."

According to Stone's research, slowing the rate of forest loss around the world, and regenerating forests where lost, could significantly slow the pace of global warming.

"Treaty negotiators should formally recognise land use change as a key driver of warming," said Stone. "The role of land use in global warming is the most important climate-related story that has not been widely covered in the media."

Stone recommends slowing what he terms the "green loss effect" through the planting of millions of trees in urbanised areas and through the protection and regeneration of global forests outside of urbanised regions.
Forested areas provide the combined benefits of directly cooling the atmosphere and of absorbing greenhouse gases, leading to additional cooling. Green architecture in cities, including green roofs and more highly reflective construction materials, would further contribute to a slowing of warming rates. Stone envisions local and state governments taking the lead in addressing the land use drivers of climate change, while the federal government takes the lead in implementing carbon reduction initiatives, like cap and trade programs.

"As we look to address the climate change issue from a land use perspective, there is a huge opportunity for local and state governments," said Stone. "Presently, local government capacity is largely unharnessed in climate management structures under consideration by the U.S. Congress. Yet local governments possess extensive powers to manage the land use activities in both the urban and rural areas."

Author: David Terraso

Global warming emissions: Deforestation and degradation play crucial role

As fossil fuel emissions rise, deforestation makes up smaller per cent, still significant problem

Scientists and non-governmental organisations at the U.N. climate negotiations commented today on the percentage of global warming emissions that is due to tropical deforestation, in light of a new analysis published earlier this week in Nature Geoscience. The group, which included most of the leading experts on deforestation emissions, has released the following statement.

'The new paper and other papers and IPCC reports published in the last few years, lead us to conclude that the percentage of global emissions of CO₂ from deforestation and forest degradation is less than the commonly used figure of "about 20 per cent". The best current estimate would be about 15 per cent if peat degradation is included. Given the uncertainties involved one can not rely on estimates to the nearest 1 per cent.

The change in the estimate is due to several factors, including increases in fossil fuel emissions as well as revision of the estimates of deforestation emissions, due to new data and scientific analyses. The change is NOT due to a decrease in deforestation since the 1990s, and in fact the analyses agree that global deforestation in the early 2000s has been similar to that in the 1990s. So, this new estimate is NOT a sign of progress.

This figure includes deforestation, forest degradation, and peat emissions from deforestation and degradation (including later decomposition and fires in peat from previously deforested areas).

These changes and the new paper are typical of how science advances, and reflect our improved ability to measure the emissions due to deforestation. They reinforce the point that reducing emissions from tropical deforestation is critical to slowing global warming. These emissions are comparable to the emissions of all of the European Union, and are greater than those of all cars, trucks, planes, ships and trains worldwide.

Reducing tropical forest emissions remains a relatively cost-effective option to reduce
emissions. We would highlight some important lines from the new paper:

'…reducing fossil fuel emissions remains the key element for stabilising atmospheric CO₂ concentrations. Nevertheless, efforts to mitigate emissions from tropical forests and peatlands, and maintain existing terrestrial carbon stocks, remain critical….'"

Tackling climate change at frontline of Indonesian rainforest destruction

Photo: WikimediaInglourious Basterds star Mélanie Laurent joins the action

Fifty Greenpeace activists have taken action to prevent the destruction of Indonesia's rainforests and called on world leaders to end global deforestation, which is responsible for about a fifth of all greenhouse gas emissions. The call came as negotiators meet in Barcelona, Spain for the final round of talks before December's critical UN climate summit in Copenhagen.

Greenpeace activists completed the construction of a dam across one of the many canals built to drain the rainforest and peat soils in order to make way for plantations on the Kampar Peninsula on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. This destruction emits huge quantities of CO₂ and has led Indonesia to become the world's third largest climate polluter after China and the US.

Greenpeace and members of the local forest community have spent the last week constructing the dam and were assisted over the weekend by Mélanie Laurent, star of Quentin Tarantino's new film Inglourious Basterds.

"Forest destruction is one of the main causes of climate change. That is why I came here to the frontline of forest destruction with Greenpeace, to call on world leaders to end deforestation both here and around the globe. It is key to preventing a climate catastrophe," said Mélanie Laurent, speaking from the rainforest.

Greenpeace has set up a 'Climate Defenders' Camp', in the heart of the Indonesian rainforest and intends to continue constructing dams across the Kampar Peninsula, which stores some 2 billion tonnes of carbon, in coming weeks as December's UN climate summit approaches.

"We are taking action to stop climate change right here at the frontline of forest destruction. To pull the world back from the brink of a climate crisis, we need Obama, Merkel, Sarkozy, Brown and other world leaders to commit to much deeper cuts in emissions from fossil fuels and to provide the critical funds needed to end deforestation. If they fail, we will face mass species extinction, floods, droughts and famine in our lifetime," said Greenpeace Southeast Asia campaigner Bustar Maitar.

Greenpeace will release an Indonesian Forest Fund plan at the climate meeting in Barcelona at 18.00 CET. The plan shows how the fund could help rapidly reduce emissions from deforestation.

Climate deal must include strong deforestation target

Amazon Rainforest. Photo: WikimediaGlobal leaders must support a clear and effective deforestation target at climate talks in Copenhagen in December, or they risk crippling the world’s ability to control climate change.

As the XIIIth World Forestry Congress came to an end on Friday, WWF called for an ambitious and bold climate deal at COP 15 to give clear guidance and incentives for the forestry sector to do its part in stopping catastrophic climate change and adapt to predicted changes. To this end, WWF during the Congress proposed a global target of zero net deforestation by 2020 to avoid runaway climate change and stop the current catastrophic trend of species loss.

In particular, negotiators must agree to strong financial and emissions reduction commitments to craft a climate deal that enables developing countries to halt forest loss.

“Setting immediate deforestation targets is a key component of any climate change agreement,” said Rodney Taylor, Director of WWF International’s Forest program. “If the global deal on climate change ignores the dangers of unchecked deforestation, it will set the world on an accelerated path to savage climate change.”

Despite conservation efforts, global deforestation continues at an alarming rate – 13 million hectares per year, or 36 football fields a minute. It generates almost 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and halting forest loss has been identified as one of the most cost-effective ways to keep the world out of the danger zone of runaway climate change.

“A zero net deforestation by 2020 target will set the scale and urgency needed to gather the political will to stop forest loss,” Taylor said.

WWF will continue to advocate for a strong deforestation target to be included in relevant international treaties and agreements, including in the Convention on Biological Diversity and COP 15.

“WWF received strong feedback at the Congress from various sectors, including governments, other NGOs, and the private sector to support our target on deforestation,” said Gerald Steindlegger, WWF International’s Forest Manager on Global Policy.

Many developing countries already are adopting major deforestation policies that mirror WWF’s call for zero net deforestation by 2020.

On Wednesday, government representatives from Argentina and Paraguay pledged during a special ceremony co-hosted by WWF and its partner organisation Fundacion Vida Silvestre at the Congress to work towards zero net deforestation in the Atlantic Forest, and to implement a package of measures that include national legislation to enforce those commitments.

The Atlantic Forest initially spanned 500,000 square kms, shared between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. However, only 7.4 percent of the forest is left today – or about 35,000 square kilometers, making it one of the most threatened and fragmented subtropical forests in the world.

Meanwhile, the Brazilian government already has established a zero deforestation target by 2010 for the Atlantic Forest. Brazil also has pledged to establish protected areas covering at least 10 percent of the forest.

This year, the World Forestry Congress brought together more than 4,000 participants in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Madagascar's climate change solutions through Google Earth

The power of forests to deliver climate change solutions was displayed in a new virtual tour of Madagascar launched by Google Earth in partnership with Conservation International (CI). Mixing satellite images with photos and videos, the tour shows initiatives to protect tropical forests and calls on citizens and governments to support these types of projects at the UN climate change talks in Copenhagen in December.

"These tours are aimed at making complex environmental data accessible to consumers and establishing a communications channel between the public and decision makers," said Benjamin Kott, Green Business Operations Project Manager at Google. The tour is part of a series of climate change virtual trips launched by Google Earth last week in partnership with the Danish government. It can be viewed at Google Earth (www.google.com/cop15) and on the official Copenhagen talks channel in YouTube.

Dr. Russ Mittermeier, president of CI, said: "We applaud Google for being at the forefront of using technology to help the public, policymakers and other key stakeholders understand the complex issue of climate change in a unique and exciting way. Protecting forests is crucial to help communities mitigate and adapt to our changing climate, and this tour helps tell the story of how we are doing that in Madagascar."

CI's Madagascar tour demonstrates how organisations and communities are coping with climate change. The tour will take visitors on a trip through mountains, waterfalls and rural communities in six places across the country to see how economic incentives for keeping forests standing – through carbon market initiatives like REDD+ and reforestation projects – promote economic growth, human well-being and healthy ecosystems, while at the same time supporting efforts to fight climate change.

"Deforestation has decreased 36 per cent over the past ten years in Madagascar – millions of tons of carbon emissions have been prevented. This remarkable achievement has been possible owing to importance of forests for local communities," said Dr. Frank Hawkins, head of CI’s Africa Programme.

"Madagascar and other similar countries can only continue these efforts if costs of this contribution to reducing climate change are shared with richer countries. Copenhagen must give communities in Madagascar and elsewhere the economic means to plan their own development under climate change".

Fonterra implicated in rainforest destruction

Draining peatland releases huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the world's atmosphere and is the main reason Indonesia is the world's third largest greenhouse gas emitter behind China and the US. Photo: Oka Budhi/GreenpeaceA Greenpeace investigation has revealed that the iconic New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra is implicated in Indonesian and Malaysian rainforest destruction, dead orangutans and driving global greenhouse gas emissions.

By encouraging the use of palm-based animal feed from cleared rainforests, and by pushing an intensive industrial farming model in New Zealand, Fonterra is actively contributing to one of the world's largest causes of greenhouse gas emissions, says the Greenpeace report.

The dairy giant is pushing its farmers to use hundreds of thousands of tonnes of palm-based animal feed from South-East Asia's palm oil plantations planted on land that was, until recently, covered by rainforest.

Fonterra's half-ownership of a company called RD1, a major importer of Palm Kernel Expeller (PKE) for animal feed, and an industry model which is driving New Zealand farmers to an ever more intensive use of animal feeds such as PKE. Fonterra is helping to fuel the logging of Indonesian and Malaysian rainforests and driving up New Zealand's contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions.

Animal feed

Much is known about the destructive palm oil industry but little focus has been directed on another product of palm, palm kernel animal feed (technically known as palm kernel expeller or PKE), made from the kernel of the fruit that comes from the palm plant.

Last year New Zealand imported a whopping one quarter of the world's PKE production, a figure confirmed by the US Department of Agriculture. Sourcing this destructively produced animal feed in large quantities has proved fatal for such a small country.



Figures also show that in the last decade imports have grown 2700 per cent from 400 tonnes to over 1.1 million tonnes to feed New Zealand's growing dairy herd.

While Fonterra farmers (95 per cent of farms in New Zealand are part of the Fonterra cooperative) are using this feed to boost production, the cooperative is also involved in the PKE supply chain through its half-owned RD1 subsidiary.

RD1 has close links with Wilmar International, one of the world's biggest rainforest destroyers. The palm-based animal feed that RD1 imports comes exclusively from Wilmar, alleged for its part in illegal forest destruction, illegal fires on carbon rich peatlands, destruction of endangered animal habitat and creating social conflict by illegally taking community lands.

It owns over 500,000 hectares of land - mainly in Indonesia and the majority of this is yet to be cleared for palm plantations.