Deforestation in Brazil: Coordination among different groups is inconsistent.

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Deforestation in the Amazon Aggravates Brazil’s Energy Crisis | EcoDaily

REDD+ in Brazil: Coordination needed. Now

BY BARBARA FRASER

Farming and ranching remain the main drivers of deforestation in Brazil, a new study from the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) has found.

But any new government policy to combat the problem may be undermined by lack of coordination and communication, says one of the study’s authors, Monica Di Gregorio, a senior CIFOR associate.

Sharing information and coordinating efforts are crucial for implementing policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+), the study claims.

So, to map information-sharing and collaboration networks in Brazil, researchers used questionnaires and in-depth interviews with 56 representatives of government agencies, non-government organizations (NGOs), civil society organizations, research institutions private-sector organizations and donors.

The study found that coordination among those groups is inconsistent.

Read the full article: Forests News

 

About REDD+, or reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation

Photo credit: The World Bank

Actions speak louder than words: Opportunities abound for forests in combating climate change

by ELLYSAR BAROUDY

Over the past several weeks, we have made headway in our efforts to reduce deforestation and promote sustainable land use as part of a broader World Bank Group approach to combat climate change. Partnering with the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF), the Democratic Republic of Congo has taken a major step by assessing its readiness for a large-scale initiative in which developing forested countries keep their forests standing and developed countries pay for the carbon that is not released into the atmosphere. Likewise, other countries in the 47-country FCPF partnership are making strides in their efforts to prepare for programs that mitigate greenhouse gas emission and support sustainable forest landscapes.

This approach is also known as REDD+, or reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. Active REDD+ programs can help reduce the 20 percent of carbon emissions that come from forest loss and simultaneously provide support to the 60 million people, including indigenous communities, who are wholly dependent on forests.

Through REDD+, not only do developed countries benefit from the opportunity to mitigate climate change, but forested developing countries reap the rewards for their community and ecosystem from standing trees. Working with the FCPF, the World Bank, and other delivery partners, countries at various stages are developing the building blocks for large-scale programs that address the drivers of deforestation – like unsustainable agricultural practices and commodity supply chains.

Read the full article: The World Bank

Not just trees: On SDGs, development and zero-deforestation pledges

 

Forests ‘not only about the environment’: On SDGs, zero-deforestation pledges

What we can see this year, in 2015, is that there’s a real opportunity for combining or to see a confluence between these two major international development and climate negotiations

BY CIFOR

VIDEO : https://youtu.be/6AxnqIcTe_Y

Where do forests fit into the climate and development agendas? How—and when—will the promise of REDD+ be fulfilled? What is the value of zero-deforestation pledges?

These are some of the most pressing questions for forests in 2015, and ahead of International Day of Forests (21 March), three experts from the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) sat down to talk about these issues and others.

Read the full article: CIFOR

Central Africa’s forests

Photo credit: Forest News

An oil palm plantation in southwestern Cameroon. Cash crops like palm oil still fetch a higher price here than forest-carbon incentive programs like REDD+. Flore de Preneuf/PROFOR photo

REDD+ to the rescue of Central Africa’s forests? Not yet, study says

BY JOAN BAXTER

Unfortunately, with the current prices on the carbon markets, REDD+ does not bring significant additional benefits

Enforcing sustainable logging and assigning a monetary value to the carbon stored in forest concessions managed under the REDD+ mechanism will not be enough to curb deforestation in Central Africa.

Across the Congo Basin it is more profitable to cut down the forest and replace it with cash crops, and REDD+ schemes (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) are of little help to reverse this trend, according to a new study.

Scientists from the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and CIRAD, a French agricultural and development research center, worked together to investigate the profitability of different uses of forest land in the Republic of Congo and Cameroon. The research was part of the FORAFAMA project to support the sustainable management of forests in the Congo Basin and the Brazilian Amazon Basin, funded by the French Facility for Global Environment (FFEM).

Research revealed the extent to which concessions in Cameroon and Congo are threatened by the push for agro-industrial plantations, primarily rubber and oil palm.

Read the full article: Forest News

Protection, restoration and sustainable management of forest resources (Google / ZUNIA)

Read at : Google Alerts – desertification

http://zunia.org/post/redd-and-desertification

REDD+ and Desertification

unccd.int –

Forests in drylands play a very important role. According to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005), drylands occupy 41% of the earth’s land area and are home to more than two billion people. They protect the land from desertification and conserve biodiversity. They also provide ecosystem goods and services. However, despite their value, forest ecosystems are threatened by deforestation and land degradation. This is especially true in dry forests — forests in arid, semi-arid, and dry sub-humid areas — where the mean annual precipitation is lower than the potential evapotranspiration. There are two major reasons for this: 1) dry forests are more vulnerable to degradation due to low rainfall which increases soil-erosion and reduces water storage capacity in the root zone; and 2) overexploitation of trees, land and soil resources which contributes further to deforestation.

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Investing in sustainable productivity (IIED)

Read at :

http://www.iied.org/investing-sustainable-productivity-could-secure-redd-schemes-long-term?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+duesouth+%28IIED+Blog%29

Investing in sustainable productivity could secure REDD+ schemes long term

Isilda Nhantumbo

Investing in sustainable local enterprises could help REDD+ secure projects’ long term financial viability — that was the feeling emerging in discussions at IIED and partners’ REDD+ workshop at the COP18 climate talks in Doha.

The curtain has fallen on the Qatar climate talks, including on REDD+ discussions (the scheme to reward developing countries for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation). The REDD+ fraternity was disappointed not to achieve breakthroughs in the negotiations both on finance (should it be market and / or fund based?) and on monitoring, reporting and verification systems (what guidance should be developed?).

But even if another year elapses before clear decisions on these issues, both developed and developing countries should continue with their voluntary commitments to financing, developing and implementing actions that make it worthwhile to keep carbon locked up in forests and soils.

Pushing on

REDD+ project design (IIED)

Read at :

http://www.iied.org/blogs/redd-project-design-10-points-consider-so-poor-don%E2%80%99t-lose-out?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+duesouth+%28IIED+Blog%29

REDD+ project design: 10 points to consider so the poor don’t lose out

Essam Mohammed

REDD+ aims to reward or compensate tropical developing countries for keeping their forests intact  or for reducing the scale of  deforestation. It’s predicted that financial flows to these countries from REDD+ could reach up to US$30 billion a year. So getting the issue of REDD+  benefit distribution right is crucial, not only to ensure that it is benefiting the poorest of the poor (or at least not harming them), but for building REDD+’s legitimacy both at the national and international level, which in turn will help preserve forest ecosystems.

Before REDD+ programmes begin to be implemented in earnest, lessons should be learnt from previous payment schemes, so past mistakes aren’t repeated.

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Climate Finance: REDD+ and Agriculture Post-Conference Forum (Green Power)

Read at : Green Power Conferences

The 5th annual Climate Finance and Carbon Markets Africa 2012 event will provide the opportunity to evaluate the outcomes of the UNFCCC’s COP17 meeting.   With an esteemed line up of 20+ speakers Climate Finance and Carbon Markets Africa will help you to breakdown  the decisions made and what they mean for your future strategies.

Climate Finance: REDD+ and Agriculture Post-Conference Forum

http://www.greenpowerconferences.com/EF/?sSubSystem=Registration&sEventCode=CM1201ZA&sSessionID=a13a4d76506aec7e7acb1bfea961425c-7134635

Alongside the main event, Green Power Conferences will also be running the Climate Finance Africa: REDD+ and Agriculture Post-Conference Forum on the 26 January.

Climate Finance Africa: REDD and Agriculture will be dedicated to bringing the critical issues for forest and land use projects into focus. Ideally positioned to analyze any new developments to come out of COP 17, the post event seminar will provide a platform for African stakeholders to discuss practical strategies for unleashing the environmental and social potential of REDD and climate-smart agriculture across the continent.

The momentum is growing for implementing the necessary mechanisms and frameworks to stimulate investment into REDD projects, whilst there is an ever increasing interest in leveraging the potential of carbon offsetting in agriculture.

The market for these projects in Africa remains in its infancy, and there are numerous unique challenges to consider. Attend the post event forum and be involved in discussions on the following:

The follow up from COP 17- what next for land use and forestry?
REDD in practice
Developing a successful linkage between carbon reductions and agriculture
Scaling up REDD activities
For more information or to register your place at the post event forum please click here.

I look forward to meeting you in Johannesburg.

Kind regards,

Phil Stallard

Research Analyst
Green Power Conferences

Is Mozambique ready for REDD+ ? (IIED)

Read at :

http://www.iied.org/sustainable-markets/blog/redd-mozambique-new-opportunity-for-land-grabbers?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+duesouth+%28Due+South%3A+IIED+Blog%29

REDD+ in Mozambique: new opportunity for land grabbers?

Submitted by Isilda Nhantumbo

Land is cheap and is perceived to be abundant in Africa. A scramble for its land, following the food and fuel crisis three years ago, is on. European and North American companies have been acquiring land to grow export and biofuel crops and to supply their need for pulp and paper. Now they’re being joined by newly emerging economies – in particular Brazil, India and China – which are also increasingly acquiring large tracts of land and searching for other natural resources, in particular water and minerals.

A land grab is on in my own country, Mozambique. For example, the government of Mozambique is allocating 60,000 km2 of land (7.6% of the country) in four of its provinces – Nampula, Niassa, Zambezia and Cabo Delgado – to 40 Brazilian farmers for commercial soy cultivation to supply the ever-expanding Chinese market. The land would be granted for 50 years, with the lease renewable for a further 50 years. The Mozambican government says that the investment will bring benefits to the country: “Brazilian farmers have accumulated experience that is very welcome” said Mozambique’s agriculture minister, José Pacheco in this article. “We want to repeat in Mozambique what they managed to do in the Brazilian ‘cerrado’ 30 years ago,” Pacheco added.

These plans threaten to convert the rich forests found in the provinces of Nampula, Niassa, Cabo Delgado and Zambezia into soy plantations. These provinces are already under enormous pressure due to activities such as commercial agriculture, industrial plantations, logging, biofuel farming and mining.
Hopes dashed for Mozambique

Having worked on community-based natural resources management for many years, I always felt that there was a missing link between efforts to change unsustainable land use practices, such as slash and burn agriculture and charcoal production, and the need to compensate for the resulting benefits of maintaining those resources sustainably, such as carbon stocks, watershed maintenance, biodiversity, etc. When sustainable forest management efforts to mitigate climate change evolved into REDD+, my optimism that something fundamental was about to change for the better was renewed.

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Can REDD+ live up to expectations as a tool to achieve long-term biodiversity conservation? (ASNS)

Read at :

http://africasciencenews.org/asns/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2772&Itemid=1

‘Win-Win’ Is Too Simplistic A Description For REDD+– And Possibly Wrong

Written by Terrence Sunderland

Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) coupled with co-benefits such as biodiversity conservation, sustainable development and enhancement of carbon stocks through afforestation (REDD+), accompanied by appropriate safeguards, offers “unprecedented potential funding for forest conservation and associated biodiversity”’ says a study by Jacob Phelps and colleagues, published in a recent issue of Conservation Letters.

Much of the rest of the world agrees. Since the UN climate change conference in Bali in 2007, REDD, in all its forms, has been embraced with a fervour rarely witnessed in environmental or academic circles.

However, Phelps’s study, along with a paper by Paul Hirsch and colleagues in Conservation Biology, suggest such optimism needs tempering. Both provide a reality check: Can REDD+ live up to expectations as a tool to achieve long-term biodiversity conservation?

Mexico is emerging as one of the world’s leading open-air laboratories (IFAD)

Read at :

http://ifad-un.blogspot.com/2011/03/mexico-going-green.html

Mexico Going Green

Posted by Greg Benchwick

When looking at the remarkably complex world of carbon offset, REDD+, sustainable forestry and natural resource management, Mexico is emerging as one of the world’s leading open-air laboratories.

After all, this is a place where the tides of revolution have become institutional realities, where large organizations like the National Forestry Commission (CONAFOR) are pioneering new ways to bring REDD+ into the mainstream. It is a place with a complex and nuanced socio-economic context, where the poorest 40 per cent of the rural population live on just US$652 a year (despite a national average of nearly US$9000), and where deforestation, vulnerability to climate change and natural resource management issues are making it to the front burner of the national agenda.

Put more forest land in the hands of indigenous groups and other forest residents (AlertNet)

Read at :

http://www.trust.org/alertnet/blogs/climate-conversations/keeping-forest-dwellers-involved-in-forest-protection-and-redd/

Climate Conversations – Keeping forest dwellers involved in forest protection and REDD

By Laurie Goering

It’s no coincidence that Latin America has had some of the best success protecting tropical forest. That’s because the region, led by countries like Mexico and Brazil, has put more forest land in the hands of indigenous groups and other forest residents than any other part of the developing world, according to the U.S.-based Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI).

Forest residents who own or otherwise control the land they live on have a strong incentive to protect it from illegal loggers and other destructive pressures, argues Andy White, head of the initiative, which works on forest policy issues, especially land tenure.

The proof? Brazil’s indigenous reserves have become the heart of that country’s Amazon forest protection effort, he says, and in Mexico, where communities own 80 percent of forest land, forests are more effectively managed and protected than in many parts of the world. Altogether, nearly a third of Latin America’s forests are owned or designed for use by indigenous communities, RRI figures show.

But in Africa, less than 2 percent of land is owned or controlled by forest dwellers – a major impediment to protecting forests in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, where government-owned forests benefitted from years of war – which effectively kept out big logging companies – but are now coming under increasing pressure.

“Fundamentally we think this not a healthy situation,” White argues.

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