The Accra Caucus is a coalition of more than 100 non-governmental organisations from 30 countries. It was formed in August 2008, in Accra, Ghana at a meeting organised to discuss issues and concerns associated with REDD. Before COP-15 in Copenhagen, December 2009, the Accra Caucus produced a list of key messages to be included in any agreement on REDD.
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This article was published in the World Rainforest Movement Bulletin 151, February 2010. It is loosely based on a presentation I gave at a workshop in Bogor earlier this month, about local media and REDD. The workshop was organised by the Indonesian local media association ASTEKI and the Samdhana Institute.
Two interviews with Jeff Horowitz, the founder of Avoided Deforestation Partners, were published earlier this month. The interviews reveal a great deal about why AD Partners is so interested in carbon trading. For example, Horowitz estimates that “protecting tropical forests will cut the cost of U.S. climate legislation almost in half – saving Americans billions.” This week, REDD-Monitor asked Horowitz some further questions.
Three straws in the wind: Two pieces of policy news and a new piece of research. Two weeks ago, a leaked document from the EU revealed that the European Commission and some member states hope to include oil palm plantations in the definition of forests. Yesterday, the Jakarta Post reported that Indonesia’s Forestry Ministry is drafting a decree to reclassify oil palm plantations as “forests”.
While REDD proponents and critics often provide lists of conditions that should be met before REDD can go ahead, they rarely conclude that REDD should not go ahead if these conditions are not met. As Simone Lovera explains in “REDD Realities” many of the conditions are currently not met and cannot be met – particularly if REDD is to be funded through carbon trading. “The problem with REDD is that there are simply too many ‘ifs’ to be true,” Lovera comments.
The Congo Basin forest is the second largest in the world after the Amazon. It accounts for one quarter of the world’s remaining tropical forest and covers an area of 1.8 million square kilometres. Clearly, whatever comes out of Copenhagen on REDD has to work in the Congo Basin. Two new reports take a critical look at REDD in the Congo Basin. The first, “Global Climate Politics in the Congo Basin: Unprecedented Opportunity or High-risk Gamble?” is written by Korinna Horta of International Finance, Development and Environment, and published by Heinrich Böll Stiftung. The second, “Why Congo Basin countries stand to lose out from a market based REDD“, is written by Kate Dooley of FERN.
Earlier this month, the governments of Norway and Guyana signed an agreement worth up to US$250 million that is supposed to help address climate change by reducing deforestation in Guyana. Yet at a meeting in London last week, Guyana’s President Bharrat Jagdeo admitted that under the deal the rate of deforestation in Guyana could actually increase. When asked whether Guyana will be allowed to increase deforestation under the agreement, Jagdeo said “Basically, yes.” Under the Memorandum of Understanding, signed by Jagdeo and Norway’s Minister of the Environment and International Development Erik Solheim, Norway will pay Guyana if the deforestation rate is less than 0.45 per cent. But the current rate of deforestation in Guyana is well below that figure.
On 26 June 2009, the UK Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, and Energy and Climate Secretary, Ed Miliband, visited London Zoo to launch “The Road to Copenhagen“, a report outlining the UK’s vision of the climate deal to be agreed in Copenhagen in December 2009. The report claims to be setting “ambitious” goals: “The UK believes that the over-riding goal of the Copenhagen agreement is to limit climate change to an increase in global average temperature of 2°C. This means the deal needs to establish a credible trajectory for reducing global emissions by at least 50% on 1990 levels by 2050.” But as George Monbiot points out in The Guardian, “a global cut of 50% offers only a faint-to-non-existent chance of meeting their ultimate objective: preventing more than two degrees of warming.” The 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change indicates that to have a high chance of limiting climate change to 2°C requires global cuts of 85% by 2050.
On 8 July 2009, the G8 issued a statement titled “Responsible Leadership for a Sustainable Future“. It includes a section on REDD, reproduced below. Indigenous peoples are referred to in the statement. G8 will “promote national strategies developed in collaboration with relevant players, including governments, indigenous peoples and local communities, civil society groups and the private sector”. But it’s hardly worth worrying about what the G8 says. Few, apart from Bob Geldoff and Bono, thought that the G8 Gleneagles deal would really make poverty history. The G8 meeting in Heiligendamm was supposed to be a “breakthrough in climate protection”. It wasn’t.
On Monday, 8 June 2009, Guyana’s President Bharrat Jagdeo launched a “Low Carbon Development Strategy” (LCDS) for the country. Among the foreign dignitaries at the launch was Hans Brattskar, Director of Norway’s International Climate and Forest Initiative. Jagdeo hopes that Norway is going to bankroll his plans. Media coverage in Guyana was positive. The government-owned Guyana Chronicle, for example, gushed that Jagdeo “set the stage in a 55-minute address at the International Conference Center in Liliendaal, East Coast Demerara, drawing praise immediately across the board from different stakeholders.” Of course it is not clear whether anyone with critical opinions was invited to the launch, or whether journalists made any effort to seek out critical views. Nevertheless there are several areas for concern with Jagdeo’s plans. REDD-Monitor presents the following concerns to the governments and citizens of Guyana and Norway: |
 
 
 
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