News: UN Issues Warning if Private Sector Doesn’t Invest in REDD

“Forests are the natural treasure chests of the world, providing a host of ecosystem services that – and this needs to be said very clearly and up front – are paramount to ensuring economic progress and human well-being, not only locally but globally. What forests give us is fundamental in the strictest sense of the word: they stabilise the global climate system, regulate water cycles, provide habitat for flora, fauna and people, and host genetic resources of unimaginable potential. Forests and their services remain, however, chronically undervalued by today’s economic and political decision makers, resulting in their rapid destruction. One of the many consequences of current deforestation and forest degradation is their contribution of approximately one fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions.”

– UN, REDDy Set Grow

It has been a challenging year for the carbon world, and the related sphere of  applying economic instruments for environmental protection and conservation of other ecosystem services. Variables, such as the economic downturn and the political climate on climate change have downplayed the urgency for dealing with issues like deforestation. What does all this stalling spell out for natural environments?

The UN has put out a recent report, “REDDy Set Grow: Private sector suggestions for international climate change negotiators.” The report clearly states why the forests of the world are important (which I also do in my previous Part I, II, III series on forests), why the private sector needs to get involved in financing saving them, and how they can do it through programs like REDD and REDD+.

The question is, is the involvement of certain actors within the private sector going to be enough to sway the tide of political opinion so that policy makers can put into place the kind of policies needed to take these markets beyond the voluntary scope they operate at now? A recent report by Forest Trends indicated that the last couple of years has shown many firsts for the implementation of economic instruments for forests, including the rise of forest carbon markets, with the EU leading the front for purchasing and many projects in the supply pipeline. However, in spite of the forest carbon sector being poised to take off,  many uncertainties remain as to whether the regulatory drivers that underpin demand will kick into gear in time to take these markets where they need to go. The quote below from State of the Forest Carbon Markets 2011, sums it up:

“Currently, buyers purchase most credits voluntarily, but regulatory drivers hold a critical key to unlock larger climate impacts and market demand. Across the global markets, a number of influential political choices remain to be made, and a host of market drivers remain uncertain. The consensus among dozens of market players interviewed for this report, including leaders of standards organizations and major buyers and project developers, is that the forest carbon market is entering a phase where growth will be fundamentally tied to finding and creating new demand for forest carbon credits…

Policymakers are in the midst of developing funding for forest conservation at an unprecedented scale. A number of innovative solutions have evolved to both overcome many of the earlier hurdles facing market-based forest conservation efforts and attract private sector investment, but the scope of these markets is still relatively small in the face of global forest loss and a changing climate. The fate of these markets and projects will in large part rest in the hands of policymakers. 2010 was undoubtedly a critical year in the history of the forest carbon markets, but the most consequential chapters in this story still remain to be written.”