Transcript Trees, Forests, Plantations and Climate Change

EGS1003: Section on International Environmental Justice and the Climate
Change Challenge
Mary Lawhon ([email protected])
This work by Mary Lawhon is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
 In the 1980s, 20-40% of GHG
emissions attributed to tropical
deforestation
 Stopping this seemed logically to
be part of addressing climate
change
 Conservation
 Reforestation
(These slides are based on Backstrand and Lovbrand, 2006)
FOREST FIRE
© Aleksandr Klimashin, Dreamstime
 As of 1995, includes all sinks and sources of carbon,
including forests/plantations
 “most developing countries strongly opposed the idea
that carbon storage on their territory would allow
industrialized countries to continue emitting
greenhouse gases domestically.” (Backstrand and Lovbrand,
2006: 59)
 By 2002, represented 35% of carbon benefits through
AIJ. No projects in Africa
 From Kyoto to 2001, South fights to keep
forests/plantations out of the market mechanisms
 After US walks out, concede to “save the Protocol”
 Limited to 1% of countries’ 1990 emissions
 Proponents of EM say:
 Flexibility and cost-effectiveness through tree
planting in the South
 A win-win scenario for North and South
 Participation and stakeholder involvement are central
to sustainable development
 Bottom-up
 Include marginalized voices
 “Reform” and “radical” versions
 Proponents say:
 Principled objection: “represents a ‘loophole’ i.e. an
instruent for rich countries to evade their historical
responsibility”
(Backstrand and Lovbrand, 2006: 64)
 But also, detracts from the need for long-term,
systemic change in GN
 “If the carbon uptake in terrestrial ecosystems is
inadequately measured or accidentally re-emitted to
the atmosphere as a result of fire, pest attacks, illegal
logging or climate change itself, sink projects may
result in ‘fake credits’” (Backstrand and Lovbrand, 2006:64)
By Sean Wilson for SEI
 NOT (inherently) a win-win
 Tree planting through CDM has ecological risks
 Creation of monoculture/plantations
 Loss of biodiversity
 Intensified use of chemicals and pesticides
 Disturb water cycles
 NOT (inherently) a win-win
 Tree planting through CDM has social risks
 Displacement of communities
 Loss of access to land
 Reinforce/exacerbate existing inequalities
 Ecologically- sometimes these communities move and
cause deforestation elsewhere
 CDM can be beneficial, but isn’t always
 Profit comes at the expense of justice
 Need to “design participatory projects that can meet
social development goals in the South” (Backstrand and
Lovbrand, 2006: 66)
 Explicitly consider trade-offs between environment,
development, and climate