Published by Fern 13.11.00

The negotiations here at CoP6 will culminate in decisions that have far-reaching consequences for forests and forest peoples. We are already witnessing the conversion of natural forests to large-scale tree plantations worldwide. These large-scale tree plantations almost always lead to loss of biodiversity and environmental degradation. They also often displace forest peoples and local communities. Several new tree plantations have been established in the name of climate change mitigation. This shows that when people talk about ‘carbon sinks’ to mitigate climate change, they mean large-scale tree plantations with fast-growing tree species in monoculture rather than small- scale community development or forest conservation projects.

To counteract even a small fraction of carbon dioxide emissions in the North, millions of hectares of land would have to be dedicated to sinks activities. A substantial part of these activities would be afforestation and reforestation ­ and this usually means large-scale tree plantations. Despite the popular myth that paying for the carbon services that forests offer, will provide money for forest conservation, most funds are likely to go to credits for large-scale tree plantations. Recent case studies by a range of environmental organisations document that several new large-scale tree plantations were established with an explicit reference to climate change mitigation or carbon credits (see www.gn.apc.org/fern for details and links).

Yes, it does matter because large-scale tree plantations have negative social and environmental impacts. Plantations are usually single species crops that are bred and managed for their uniformity and high yield of fibre. Due to their rapid growth they often draw heavily from the soils’ nutrient and water reserves, damaging the environment. Large-scale tree plantations are often a direct cause of deforestation. In Chile, Indonesia and Malaysia for example, native forests are converted to large-scale monoculture plantations. In countries like Uruguay and South Africa, they have replaced valuable ecosystems such as grasslands, peat lands and secondary forests.

Planting tree crops also often results in the displacement of people. People who lived on or nearby land now occupied by industrial tree plantations have in many cases lost their sources of food or income and are left with the choice to either work on the plantations or migrate to urban slums. At its worst, the growing local resistance against large-scale tree plantations has been met with violence and oppression, leading to human rights abuses, even murder.

No. The forest crisis is caused by a plethora of different causes such as logging, oil exploration, mining, industrial agriculture, infrastructure projects as well as climate change and air pollution. None of these causes will be addressed by granting carbon credits. The forest crisis can only be halted if we address both the direct and underlying causes of forest loss. Intergovernmental initiatives of past years have utterly failed to halt deforestation because they have failed to address the root causes of forest loss. These include: inequal distribution of land, over-consumption of forest products in the North, over-emphasis on the timber value of forests and the lack of recognition of forest peoples’ rights among others.

Reducing forests to one single tradable commodity ­ carbon - will address neither the direct nor the underlying causes of forest loss. As long as these links are ignored, carbon sink projects will only displace deforestation to other areas. This in turn will affect local communities and forest peoples’ lands outside the carbon mitigation project. Who will compensate them for the potential loss of livelihood resulting from deforestation caused by distant carbon sink projects? The carbon sinks approach is thus likely to exacerbate land use conflicts, deepen poverty and increase the ecological footprint of the North on our planet. The concept is already resulting in new large-scale tree plantations being established in the name of climate change mitigation.

No consideration has been given to forest biodiversity or forest peoples’ rights in the intergovernmental climate negotiations to date. Furthermore, the prerequisites for environmentally and socially sound forest projects seem to be irreconcilable with investor demands for projects that deliver ‘cost-effective’ and sizeable carbon credits that will be traded on an international market.

Large-scale tree plantations are not a solution to climate change mitigation ­ not in the long term, and not ‘to buy time’ in the short-term either. Because of the negative social and environmental impacts of large-scale tree plantations, they must be excluded from providing carbon credits in the context of the Kyoto Protocol.

In the Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), the focus must rest on promoting clean and low-impact energy technologies in countries in the South. To include carbon sinks in the CDM will lock up lands in the South for decades to come so the North can continue emitting greenhouse gases at a level that puts the very lives and livelihoods of future and present generations at risk, causing yet more poverty and environmental degradation.

For further information on the impact of plantations on forests and forest peoples see the World Rainforest Movement website www.wrm.org.uy .

For information on the impact of existing carbon sequestration projects on forests and forest peoples see ‘Tree Trouble’ a report by Friends of the Earth International, WRM and Fern (available from Fern).

For information on the climate negotiations and link between forests, plantations and carbon sinks see ‘Sinking the Kyoto Protocol’, Fern Briefing Note (www.greennet.org.uk/fern).