Forest Carbon Work On-the-Ground in Indonesia

The choice of Bali as the location for the 2007 U.N. climate conference, currently underway, is significant because Indonesia is home to the world’s third largest remaining intact tropical forest (following only Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo). This makes it crucial in the fight against global warming. At this year’s conference, there has been much focus on offsetting carbon emissions by preventing deforestation – a concept known as “avoided deforestation” or Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD). Indonesia is also the world’s fourth largest global emitter of greenhouse gas emissions, many of which come from forest fires, legal and illegal logging, and forest-clearing for single crop plantations such as palm oil. The Indonesia team at WRI works with an assortment of governmental, non-governmental and international organizations to not only create effective monitoring tools and systems but also help establish baseline figures from which decision-makers can judge future improvement. Indonesia’s first Interactive Forestry Atlas, which we’re completing with the country’s Ministry of Forestry’s Forest Monitoring and Assessment System (FOMAS), will be released in 2008. We’re also working on an assortment of investigations into the regional impacts from carbon emissions, biofuels production, and land use and tree cover change. Sekala, an Indonesian non-profit that works closely with us on forest- and carbon-related activities, was recently featured in an informative article by Mongabay.com. In the interview, Sekala’s director, Ketut Deddy, explains his NGO’s work on the ground and how it corresponds to the new REDD strategy being endorsed by the World Bank.