Via Campesina rejects REDD and carbon trading

La Viá Campesina rejects REDD and carbon trading

Vía Campesina is an international movement of peasants, small- and medium-sized producers, landless, rural women, indigenous people, rural youth and agricultural workers. It is a coalition of around 150 organisations, with an estimated 300 million members. Vía Campesina recently put out a statement about COP-16 in Cancún.

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Shift2Neutral responds

Brett Goldsworthy, chairman of Shift2Neutral has responded to REDD-Monitor’s email asking some questions about his company’s REDD-type projects in Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia. He states that his company “deals in facts”, but provides no new information. He states that his company manages its project “in an ethical and open way” but apparently only “to those people involved in the project”.

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Shift2Neutral in the Philippines, or how to make a Porsche “carbon neutral”

Shift2Neutral in the Philippines, or how to make a Porsche 'carbon neutral'

In response to last week’s post about an Australian carbon trading company, Shift2Neutral, REDD-Monitor received a statement from CoDe REDD in the Philippines (posted below). The Climate Change Commission wrote to Shift2Neutral recommending that the company’s “carbon credit activities be held in abeyance,” until the commission has “promulgated the guidelines and the rules addressing this issue”.

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Australian company Shift2Neutral signs REDD deals in Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines

JOAS Climate Change focal point, Jen Rubis, at Copenhagen climate change negotiations 2009. PHOTO: Ben Powless

Jaringan Orang Asal SeMalaysia (JOAS), the Indigenous Peoples Network of Malaysia, put out a press release on 10 August 2010 about a carbon trading deal with indigenous peoples in Sarawak. On 6 August 2010, Reuters reported that an Australian carbon trading company called Shift2Neutral had “signed a deal with nine Malaysian tribal leaders to certify carbon offsets from a project aimed at preserving more than 100,000 hectares of tropical forest”.

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Does the Opportunity Cost Approach Indicate the Real Cost of REDD+?

“Curbing deforestation is a highly cost-effective way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and has the potential to offer significant reductions fairly quickly.” With this statement from his 2006 report, “The Economics of Climate Change”, Nicholas Stern, Lord Stern of Brentford Kt, FBA, gave REDD a huge boost. But how much truth there is in this statement?

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Civil Society excluded from Interim REDD+ Partnership meeting in Brasilia

Civil Society excluded from Interim REDD+ Partnership meeting in Brasilia

On 14-15 July 2010, a meeting of the Interim REDD+ Partnership took place in Brasilia. The co-chairs of the Partnership sent an invitation dated 6 July 2010 (pdf file 48.1 KB) to an apparently randomly selected list of development and environment NGOs, businesses and research organisations. The email stated that there was space in the meeting for 12 organisations to send 2 people.

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The emergence of the REDD Hydra: New report by Forest Peoples Programme

The emergence of the REDD Hydra

In Greek mythologoy, the hydra was a serpent with seven heads. When one head was cut off, it grew two more. It was so poisonous that even its breath was deadly. In a recent report for Forest Peoples Programme, Francesco Martone, who has been following the REDD negotiations at the UNFCCC in detail, suggests that “Advocacy on REDD+ is akin to confronting a hydra.”

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Baka, Bagyeli and Bakola forest people express their concerns about REDD in Cameroon

Baka, Bagyeli and Bakola forest people express their concerns about REDD in Cameroon, PHOTO: WWF

On 30 June 2010, a range of civil society organisations and indigenous peoples met in Yaounde to discuss a series of consultations on potential REDD projects that have been taking place in southern Cameroon. A press release from Forest Peoples Programme highlights the key concerns raised by the Baka, Bagyeli and Bakola forest communites. The press release is also available in French, below.

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“We want to change this threat to an opportunity”: Interview with Abdon Nababan and Mina Setra

We want to change this threat to an opportunity: Interview with Abdon Nababan and Mina Setra

Interview with Abdon Nababan, secretary general of the Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara (AMAN – The Indigenous Peoples Alliance of the Archipelago), and Mina Setra the head of international policy at AMAN. The interview took place in AMAN’s office in Jakarta on 9 June 2010.

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What to do with REDD? A manual for indigenous trainers

What to do with REDD? A manual for indigenous trainers

What is REDD” and “What to do with REDD?” are two booklets produced for indigenous peoples. The first provides a detailed overview of what REDD is and the second is a training manual for indigenous trainers to facilitate a training on REDD for indigenous peoples.

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reddisms:

“I’ve got nothing to talk about. I am really sick of you people casting aspersions on my company. No payment has been made to PNG, your information is incorrect…. I am not explaining at all. I am not having this conversation.” — Jim Johnson, Carbon Planet, in reply to questions about a payment of A$1.2 million to develop carbon trading projects in PNG, June 2009

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