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The UN-REDD programme in Papua New Guinea has been very quiet about the on-going controversy involving carbon trading and REDD in the country. REDD-Monitor asked UN-REDD some questions in an attempt to find out what the UN-REDD programme has been doing to address the problems. Unfortunately, UN-REDD remains very quiet on the subject.
The indigenous Ogiek people living in the Mau Forest Complex in Kenya are threatened with eviction to make way for the government’s conservation plans. The government has already started evicting 1,690 non-Ogiek families from the Mau Forest. They have nowhere to go. The Mau Forest Secretariat says that because they have no title deeds they do not qualify for any compensation. Karanja Njoroge, a journalist with The Standard spent a day and a night with the evicted people and described it as “an experience of extreme despair and squalour of people who say they have been kicked out without being allowed to harvest their crops.”
The UN-REDD Programme is seeking nominations for four representatives from Civil Society Organisations to serve on its Policy Board. It is important that the UN-REDD adopts meaningful environmental and social safeguards as well as upholding the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities. And unless NGOs, Indigenous Peoples and other civil society organisations push for this it is unlikely to happen. For those who can survive this sort of potential policy black hole, further information is available on the UN-REDD website.
In March 2009, the UN-REDD programme released a document titled “UN-REDD Programme Operational Guidance: Engagement of Indigenous Peoples & other forest dependent communities“. In September 2008, the United Nations launched its UN-REDD programme. According to information released by the UN “Nine countries have already expressed formal interest in receiving assistance through the UN-REDD Programme: Bolivia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Indonesia, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Tanzania, Viet Nam, and Zambia.” A “Framework Document” dated June 2008 provides more detail about the programme. The analysis presented raises several concerns with UN-REDD, but what is far more worrying is what is excluded from the Framework Document.
In September 2008, the UN and Norway launched a UN-REDD programme. The press release is below. It’s interesting to look at what they are saying about Indonesia: “Indonesia has the potential to be compensated $1 billion a year if its deforestation rate was reduced to one million hectares annually.” |
    
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