WRI Stories Feed: Forest Landscapes Initiative

Protecting Forests and Community Rights in the DRC

Pierre Methot — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:17:50 -0400

The Democratic Republic of Congo cancelled logging operation titles in 12 million hectares of tropical forest this year in an effort to promote sustainable, socially responsible forest management.

Covering a land area equivalent to the size of Western Europe, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is one of Africa’s richest countries in terms of natural and human resources. Supported by ample rainfall and fertile soil, the nation’s vast forests and mineral resources are reservoirs of potential wealth for the nation’s 65 million citizens.

Despite this abundance of natural resources, the DRC’s formal economy essentially collapsed during the last few decades due to mismanagement, lack of capacity and political will, and social unrest following two damaging wars between 1996 and 2003. The GDP per capita is now one of the lowest in the world—$300 in 2008—and the national faculty for environmental management is limited.

But the DRC is turning itself around. The recent democratic election, coupled with the support of the international development community, provides an incredible opportunity to promote strong governance and help the country develop on a sustainable track.

This growing political will and commitment to sustainable development is exemplified by recent events in the DRC forest sector: events which were supported by the World Resources Institute.

Accounting for 60 percent of forest coverage in the Congo Basin (120 million hectares), the DRC’s forests provide shelter, food, medicine, and spiritual and cultural value to the Congolese population. After the most recent war ended, the government initiated significant steps to shed necessary light into activities taking place within the country’s forest industry in order to curb illegal logging and deforestation.

These efforts culminated in a new Forest Code in 2002. The Forest Code replaced colonial rules and regulations, and for the first time set a foundation for sustainable, socially responsible forest management in the DRC. In conjunction with a 2004 moratorium on the issuance of new logging concessions, the new Forest Code mandated a broad list of environmental, forest management and social requirements that would now apply to all logging operation titles in the DRC. To achieve these, the DRC government in 2005 launched a multi-stakeholder forest title conversion process, or legal review, designed to convert old logging titles into new forest concessions that would respect the new Forest Code.

What Others Are Saying

“In my opinion, the DRC conversion process has been a massive accomplishment, considering the progress that has been made. In 2004, when we first sat down with logging companies and NGOs, you could cut the tension with a knife. Now almost every logging company in the DRC is talking about sustainable forest management.”

John Flynn, Director of USAID’s Central Africa Regional Program for the Environment (CARPE).

“For the DRC—this process put order into the forest sector. There were those in the industrial sector that did not follow regulations and pay their contributions to the state. Following the conversion process, there is now visibility on the ground, especially towards local communities in converted forest titles. We now know who is in the sector, what they are paying, and what the state gains from what they are logging.”

Honorable Pius Bitakuya Dunia, a national DRC Parliamentarian and President of the Environment and Natural Resource Commission.

“The fact that there was an international presence made members of the DRC’s Interministerial Commission aware of their responsibility towards the international community. The Congolese administration did not have the capacity to review, examine, and prepare necessary documents for the Commission. I firmly believe we would not have achieved the results we have today had it not been for the support of WRI.”

Augustin Mpoyi, Executive Director of the Council for Environmental Defense by Legality and Traceability (CODELT) and Member of Interministerial Commission.

In collaboration with Belgian partner AGREGO, WRI served as the international Independent Observer during the process—monitoring the integrity of the proceedings, recording the progress of the conversion process, and making reports public. Simultaneously, WRI-AGRECO strengthened the technical capacity of the DRC government to properly conduct the documentation and field evaluation of the forest title conversion requests submitted by title holders.

WRI faced an uphill battle, amid international concern over the environmental and social consequences of opened or closed forest concessions, as well as the legality of the process itself. Moreover, WRI, along with other international and local NGOs, continuously advocated the maintenance of the environmental and social goals promised at the outset of the process by the World Bank and the DRC government.

At the end of its involvement as Independent Observer in February 2009, WRI-AGRECO formally attested that the process had been carried out in full compliance with the legal provisions applicable in the DRC and general principles of law. Out of the initial 156 titles for which a request for conversion submitted to the DRC government, only 65 were declared convertible by the Interministerial Commission, for a total area of 10 million hectare out of the 22 million hectare under review. The remaining titles, which covered a combined area equal to the size of Pennsylvania, were deemed illegal and subject to cancellation.

DRC Forest Title Conversion Process Results

The outcomes of the conversion process are far reaching and have set the groundwork for transparency, accountability, and sustainable management in the DRC forest sector.

Throughout the process, up-to-date and complete information on the logging titles was made publicly available for the first time ever in the DRC. Information on the progress, constraints, limitations and results of the entire forest title process was also made freely available through reports, a project website, and numerous information workshops and meetings. Through these various avenues, forest information reached all national and international stakeholders—a strong and essential step towards transparency and improved governance in the forest sector. Moreover, by providing an efficient and practical training platform, the process improved the capacity of both the government and civil society in the DRC.

WRI’s particular involvement in the process brought international recognition to the DRC’s efforts to promote sustainable forest management. By insisting on the involvement of local and indigenous populations, WRI helped elevate the degree of participation by groups that had traditionally been marginalized in forest resource management decision-making, setting the path to a real participatory approach to forest allocation and management.

Despite some imperfections, the conversion process was hailed as a success by the majority of national and international stakeholders involved. In addition to promoting a sustainable future for the DRC, the lessons learned through the conversion process will inform and serve as examples for similar processes in the future in both the DRC and abroad, whether in forestry or any other natural resourced-based sector.

Working Towards Greater Forest Sector Transparency in Gabon

Matthew Steil — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 08:44:52 -0400

The first-ever Interactive Forest Atlas for Gabon offers data and tools to support the sustainable management of Gabon’s forests.

At the launch event in May, S.E. Emile Doumba, the Gabonese Minister of Forest Economy, Water, Fishing, and Aquaculture, said:

With this dynamic atlas, the government of Gabon affirms its commitment to transparency and good governance in forest management. The forest data produced by this partnership [with WRI] are now available for public use.

No more than a year ago, Mr. Doumba’s speech would have been impossible to give in the Republic of Gabon.

Covered 80% by lush tropical forest, Gabon contains some of the world’s most valuable, biodiverse forested regions. During past decades, however, forest data and maps were guarded from the public – creating dangerous confusion on the ground and forming a significant obstacle to sustainable forest management.

It was commonplace for citizens living within Gabon’s forests to witness logging operations crossing into their communities or customary lands unannounced, posing a serious threat to their livelihoods. Companies operating in logging concessions faced a similar predicament, unable to secure their concession borders and prevent neighboring companies from poaching trees.

In the absence of clearly defined, publicly available logging boundaries, forest communities and companies alike had no platform from which to defend their rights.

Acknowledging these problems, Gabon began to enact reforms during the 1990s to strengthen management of its forest resources and better address the access rights of its citizens. A new forest code, promulgated in 2001, mandated improvements in key areas, including:

sustainable forest management of production forests – including the necessary informational management infrastructure;
a multi-use approach to forest resources – away from a purely extractive focus;
decentralization of forest resource management through community forestry; and
explicit conservation and ecosystem protection objectives.

S.E. Emile Doumba (second from left) speaking during the launch of the first Interactive Forest Atlas of Gabon in Libreville. (May 13, 2009)In 2006, WRI signed an MOU with the Ministry of Forest Economy, Water, Fishing, and Aquaculture (MEFEPA) to collect data and create tools necessary to support sustainable management of Gabon’s forests. These efforts culminated in the creation of the first-ever Interactive Forest Atlas for Gabon, which WRI launched this May in Libreville.

Through an interactive collection of maps and data sets, the CD-ROM Atlas and accompanying report provide the government and – equally important – the public with an accurate presentation of activity occurring within Gabon’s forest sector.

Designed in an accessible, user-friendly format, the Atlas will serve as a standardized base of reference, transforming the way Gabon collects, manages, and distributes forest information. Above all, the Atlas gives all stakeholders, from government agencies and private companies to NGOs and forest communities, an avenue to access accurate forest information in pursuit of enforcing regulations and defending their rights.

Forest Management in Gabon: As the official poster for the Gabon Interactive Atlas project, this map provides an overview of current logging titles and protected areas in Gabon as of December 2008.

Gabon’s small population and the high revenues stemming from oil production have historically sheltered its forest resources from agricultural and industrial pressures. However, with global demand for wood and other forest resources on the rise - particularly from Asian markets – forests have become a central economic resource. Gabon’s forest sector currently accounts for 13 percent of national exports (2.5 percent of GDP) and employs 28,000 citizens – 28 percent of the working population.

The new Atlas will help ensure that forests continue to play a key role in Gabon’s economy, while at the same time helping the government make certain that forest operations are legal, sustainable, and respectful of local rights to resources. Moreover, the Atlas project is strengthening the technical expertise and capacity of the Gabonese government, ultimately allowing it to more effectively monitor and manage the nation’s forests.

WRI and MEFEPA are committed to regularly updating the information contained within the Interactive Forest Atlas, as well as to expanding its application through subsequent versions. A revised version of the Gabon Forestry Atlas is scheduled for release next year and will expand data in several key areas, notably small logging permits, annual harvestable areas, forest plantations, and production/export statistics.

As international attention turns towards the connection between deforestation and climate change, Gabon—along with its Central African neighbors—faces a novel suite of opportunities related to the future of forest resource use. Through the right set of policies, institutions and incentives Gabon may be able to move from the status quo of economic development versus environmental conservation and towards a future where these two objectives better converge.

Jean Sylvestre Makak is the Libreville-based National Coordinator for WRI’s Forest Information and Governance project in Gabon.

Expanded Guide Links Business Payoffs and Sustainable Forest Management

Ruth Nogueron — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 09:53:10 -0400

WRI and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development today released an updated online guide to help corporate buyers ensure the sustainability of their wood- and paper-based products.

Tools to support the sustainable procurement of products abound, as governments, NGOs, and other groups seek to address deforestation and forest degradation through the marketplace and combat climate change. However, the growing number of tools can be confusing and overwhelming for many companies.

One year ago, WRI and the WBCSD joined forces to launch an information and decision-making tool to assist readers in developing and implementing sustainable procurement policies for forest products. The report, Sustainable Procurement of Wood and Paper-based Products, addresses the top 10 questions that corporate procurement managers should ask when purchasing forest-based products. Among other topics, the Guide covers issues such as product legality, sustainability and climate change implications. The report also includes a “guide to the guides,” which helps companies steer through the maze of resources that have emerged to aid sustainable procurement.

The 2009 online update of this guide includes the characterization of 13 additional resources and a comprehensive list of publicly available private sector procurement policies and the issues they cover. This updated, practical guide will help business leaders define and implement economically sound and environmentally friendly purchasing policies, while simultaneously promoting sustainable forest management.

Recent studies estimate that more than 7.3 million hectares of trees are lost each year to deforestation, primarily caused by permanent conversion to crop and grazing land, especially in developing countries. This uniquely human activity now accounts for 15-20% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Governments around the world have taken consequent actions to curb deforestation and illegal timber trade – exemplified by last year’s amendment to the US Lacey Act and the recent decision by the European Parliament to adopt tighter rules to keep illegal timber off of the EU market.

Accordingly, companies and their consumers are increasingly more sensitive to the legality of their products and their effect on climate change. The sustainable procurement of forest products can therefore help companies reduce their reputation risk and, at the same time, encourage environmentally friendly business practices up and down their supply chain.

WRI and the WBCSD are committed to annual updates of this important guide. The first Guide gave buyers an important overview of the business payoffs and environmental benefits achieved through sustainable purchasing. This new edition builds on that success, providing companies with an updated virtual Rolodex of the information and tools currently available to protect their operations and the planet.

Co-author James Griffiths is Managing Director of WBCSD’s Ecosystems Focus Area, Water Project and Sustainable Forest Products Industry.

Fact Sheet: Climate Change, Forests and Finance

Florence Daviet — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:30:34 -0400

Reliable, long-term funding from the U.S. and other developed countries could help maintain forests and mitigate climate change.

Download fact sheet (PDF, 2 pages, 113 Kb).

Q: Why is preserving tropical forests essential to curbing and adapting to climate change?

A: Healthy forests are critical both to mitigating climate change and helping people and communities adjust to the impacts of climate change. Deforestation increases greenhouse gases, contributing to climate change, but intact forests can store carbon and thus can be part of the solution.

Downloads

Fact Sheet (PDF, 2 pages, 113 Kb): Includes footnotes and references

Quick Facts

Carbon stored worldwide in forest biomass, deadwood, litter and soil totals one trillion tons, roughly fifty percent more than the amount found in the atmosphere.
Emissions from deforestation and forest degradation represent roughly 25 percent of global anthropogenic GHG emissions.
Global forest loss equates to one football field a second or 86,400 football fields a day.
In Brazil, Cameroon, and Ghana, emissions from deforestation represent between 80% – 92% of their total national greenhouse gas emissions.

Maintaining healthy forests will be important to help increase human resilience to climate change. As weather patterns become more unpredictable and extreme, the role of forest ecosystems in regulating watershed quality and quantity, rainfall, erosion and other services will be increasingly important for sustaining agriculture, energy production, and drinkable water supplies. More than one in four of the world’s poor people depend on forests for their livelihood, medication and shelter, and many more are reliant on the vital services forests provide.

Preserving forests to achieve these climate mitigation and adaptation goals requires not only reducing rates of deforestation (and related emissions), but also maintaining today’s healthy forest cover.

Q: So what should the United States do to maintain tropical forest cover?

A: Most of the world’s remaining forests are in developing countries. Forest degradation and deforestation is the biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions in many of these emerging nations. Recognizing this, developing countries have proposed (in the United Nations climate negotiations) that they can be part of the climate solution by reducing forest-related emissions and maintaining healthy forests, but to do that they need help. Some need new technologies and training to monitor and combat forest fires and illegal logging activities. Others need administrative and institutional capacity to help clarify land tenure rights and implement legal reform processes. Many countries need to develop more sustainable and efficient agricultural practices to reduce pressure on forests while meeting national food and fuel needs.

The United States and other developed countries can support these types of activities by providing reliable, long-term funding, with the goal of reducing global greenhouse gas emissions.

The United States can also help by reviewing and addressing market conditions that drive deforestation and make it difficult for developing countries to protect their forests from illegal logging activities. For example, Congress recently passed an amendment to the Lacey Act1 prohibiting the import of timber produced in contravention of the laws of timber-exporting countries. Congress can ensure that there is sufficient funding to implement the new Lacey Act provisions, recognizing that it may take several years to significantly alter developing country institutional capacity as well as developed country forest product markets.

Q: Where would the money come from to help maintain tropical forests?

A: Funding could be generated directly from revenues raised through a U.S. cap-and-trade program. Provisions to either appropriate allowances or revenue from selling allowances to industries for this purpose are included in climate bills currently before Congress, including the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act.

Q: How can we make sure developing countries use the money to make real changes to reduce their deforestation and maintain healthy forests?

A: There will need to be criteria and transparent performance metrics to qualify developing countries for access to international funding. In addition, countries will need to report and verify that they are spending it on activities that reduce deforestation and maintain healthy forests. These criteria are already being discussed in various venues and include:

Showing leadership and commitment through comprehensive national forest action plans
Measuring progress in governance and legal reform as well as improved stewardship practices to demonstrate implementation of national plans
Establishing national land use sector inventories and tracking national land use emissions

Q: Can we reduce deforestation through offsets?

A: Reducing deforestation and degradation using a carbon credit or “offset” is an area of active discussion in the international climate negotiations and in U.S. climate legislation, offering promising support and a new market for reducing deforestation and degradation. It is important to note that several key criteria must be achieved to ensure the environmental credibility of offsets.

First, offsets must be real, additional, verifiable, and enforceable. Ensuring this entails collecting detailed data to set credible national-level emissions baselines, and then implementing sophisticated monitoring to measure performance. For example, deforestation and forest degradation activities could shift from one part of a country to a different part of the country, and it must be transparent and reported when this occurs. Most importantly, countries providing forest offsets will need sufficient institutional capacity to develop, implement, and enforce policies that ensure the permanence of such emissions reductions over time.

For most countries, creating credible offsets that can meet these conditions will require assistance to develop adequate institutional capacity. Countries will need processes to clarify land tenure (including the right to own the carbon dioxide stored on the land), protect human rights, put in place administrative systems for transparently and accurately tracking all land transactions, and to ensure reliable court systems to deal with criminals involved in forest-related activity.

Developing countries’ institutional capacity to implement policies and programs can be undertaken in parallel with, or as part of, actions to reduce deforestation and forest degradation. But many countries will not have sufficient existing resources to do so without upfront support in the form of financing from developed countries. For these countries to play their part, reliable, long-term funding from developed countries, including the United States, is a critical part of the equation.

WRI Announces Project to Promote Conservation of Southern U.S. Forests; Toyota Funds Regional Effort

Paul Mackie — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:58:21 -0500

The World Resources Institute (WRI) and Toyota today launched Southern Forests for the Future, a WRI project designed to raise awareness of the threats facing southern U.S. forests and increase the amount of forest conserved or managed in a sustainable manner.

“The forests of the southern United States are being whittled away acre by acre,” said Jonathan Lash, president of WRI. “We plan to raise awareness about trends in southern forests and develop innovative approaches for conserving this national treasure. WRI is grateful to Toyota for making this effort possible.”

Image courtesy of Invasive.orgToyota is funding the project with a $1.49 million grant over three years. The project includes three components:

Increase awareness about the threats facing southern forests and the value they provide;
Identify and develop a portfolio of options that align economic incentives with forest stewardship; and
Pilot test and implement these options.

“WRI has a long and successful history of transforming information and analysis into practical solutions for sustaining our natural ecosystems,” said Patricia Salas Pineda, group vice president of Toyota Motor North America. “Toyota is proud to support this initiative.”

The forests of the southern United States stretch from east Texas to Virginia and from Kentucky to Florida. Covering more than 200 million acres, they are among the most biologically diverse temperate forests in the world and provide a wide range of ecosystem services including timber, paper, watershed protection, carbon storage, and recreation. However, approximately one million acres are lost each year to urban development and unsustainable forest management practices.

Through this project, WRI will develop online time-series maps showing changes in southern U.S. forest cover over recent decades. In early 2010, WRI will launch a Web site called See My Forest, which will allow environmental organizations, governments, universities, and schoolchildren to scroll over these maps, zoom in on areas of interest, and view a range of supporting information about forest conditions and trends.

“Many people are failing to grasp the extent of southern forest degradation because continuous but dispersed forest loss often goes unnoticed,” said Craig Hanson, director of WRI’s People & Ecosystems Program. “This project will help address this.”

WRI also will identify, assess, and pilot-test a portfolio of incentives designed to encourage private landowners to retain their forests and manage them sustainably to provide a full range of ecosystem services. Some of the options include payments for watershed protection, recreational user fees, and voluntary land offset programs. During this phase of the project, WRI will be collaborating with several other organizations and institutions.

“A key factor underlying forest degradation is that economic incentives often don’t support sustainable forest stewardship,” added Hanson. “We need to implement new approaches to get economics and forest conservation aligned.”

WRI, NewPage Launch Partnership to Protect Indonesian Forests

Paul Mackie — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 13:33:06 -0500

The World Resources Institute (WRI) and NewPage Corporation today announce a partnership to protect forests in Indonesia. NewPage will substantially fund WRI’s “Project POTICO” (Palm Oil, Timber, Carbon Offsets), an initiative to combat illegal logging and preserve virgin rainforests in Indonesia by diverting new oil palm plantations to degraded lands.

“Deforestation is having a significant impact on people, biodiversity and the climate,” said Jonathan Lash, president of WRI. “Project POTICO will relieve pressure on Indonesia’s virgin tropical rainforests, reduce greenhouse gas emissions from forest clearing, and prevent the loss of biodiversity in forests slated for conversion to oil palm plantations. Well-designed oil palm plantations in degraded areas would create local jobs and protect traditional livelihoods of forest-dependent people.”

“Project POTICO, in combination with the U.S. Lacey Act, will help level the global playing field by minimizing illegal logging and reducing the amount of product brought into the United States that is produced in violation of the law,” said Rick Willett, president and chief operating officer for NewPage. Recent amendments to the Lacey Act now make it illegal to import into the U.S. wood or paper derived from illegally harvested trees. “We are making an investment in this project because we strongly believe that major improvements must be made globally in the area of sustainable forest management.”

Indonesia’s tropical rainforests are being cleared at a rapid rate, primarily by construction of oil palm plantations. One consequence is that Indonesia has now become, according to some estimates, the world’s third largest emitter of greenhouse gases. Although the country has at least 50 million acres of degraded land that could be used for plantations, oil palm, timber, and rubber plantations continue to push into virgin forests and fuel illegal logging.

Palm oil, derived from the fruit of oil palm trees, has become extremely popular for use in snack foods. A versatile oil, it is also used in consumer products such as soaps and cosmetics, and more recently to create biofuel. Indonesia is now the world’s largest palm oil producer, which has led to a dramatic depletion of the nation’s forest cover.

A palm oil plantation in Indonesia, Photo courtesy of Flickr user Films4ConservationThrough Project POTICO, WRI will implement a three-year strategy designed to curb new oil palm plantations from clearing Indonesia’s virgin forests. The strategy will divert new oil palm plantations onto degraded lands and bring forests that were slated for conversion into certified sustainable forestry or conservation status. Project POTICO is designed to help curb illegal logging, which often occurs hand-in-hand with oil palm plantation development.

The project seeks to convert up to 1.25 million acres of degraded land into oil palm plantations. Lands slated to be oil palm plantations will remain standing as protected forest or will be sustainably managed to supply Forest Stewardship Council-certified wood or fiber for use in paper products.

“A key component of our sustainability strategy at NewPage is proactive involvement in improving the global environment, which aligns perfectly with our partnership with WRI and the strategy behind Project POTICO,” said Dave Bonistall, vice president, Environmental, Health and Safety. “We are very pleased to be a partner with WRI on this very important project and look forward to achieving great success in significantly reducing illegal logging in Indonesia.”

NewPage customers can also support this initiative by purchasing select NewPage products where a portion of the proceeds from the paper sale will be contributed to Project POTICO. Customers can use the Project POTICO logo on their printed communications which symbolizes their contribution.

WRI, EIA Form Partnership to Stem Illegal Forest Products Imported Into U.S.

Paul Mackie — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 09:18:43 -0500

The World Resources Institute and the Environmental Investigation Agency today launch a partnership to combat illegal logging worldwide and clean up timber supply chains.

Photo courtesy of Environmental Investigation AgencyThe partnership focuses on the 100-year old Lacey Act, which was recently amended to include plant products - including timber and wood.

“The Lacey Act, if enforced, has the potential to send a powerful signal around the world that the U.S. is serious about curtailing illegal logging. Increasingly, illegal logging and deforestation contribute to climate change,” said Jonathan Lash, president of WRI.

Signed into law by President William McKinley, the Lacey Act has been a powerful tool used by the U.S. to battle wildlife trafficking by prohibiting the transportation of illegally captured animals or wildlife products across state lines. The new amendment extends this protection to plants and their derivative products, including items ranging from lumber and wood furniture to paper and sporting goods.

“The bill marks the first time that a major consuming country has made the trade in illegally logged wood a crime. It provides a precedent-setting tool to change the face of a $1 trillion industry, reduce deforestation, and improve forestry governance,” said Alexander von Bismarck, executive director at EIA.

Proposed in 2007 by Representative Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), with co-sponsorship by President-elect Barack Obama, the bill received widespread backing from a broad coalition of environmental, industry, and labor groups, led by the EIA.

The WRI-EIA partnership will support the coalition by delivering objective and timely information to governments and the private sector to facilitate adherence to Lacey Act requirements. The Lacey Act allows the U.S. Department of Justice to prosecute if a product is produced in violation of the relevant laws of the country of origin and is brought into the United States.

“The WRI-EIA partnership will provide companies and government officials with FAQ sheets, forest information reports, and procurement guides. These will help them ask important questions to ensure their producers and importers trade in legally-sourced products,” said Dr. Lars Laestadius, senior associate at WRI.

“The U.S. is the world’s largest market for forest products,” said David Bonistall, vice president, Environmental, Health & Safety at NewPage. “The Lacey Act is monumental in that it could domino into other countries and increase transparency within the global wood market, ultimately enhancing the reputation of forest products as a sustainable material.”

“The Lacey Act will protect the forest-products industry’s global reputation by helping eliminate illegal logging, which in some places is carried out by organized crime, spreading violence and deforestation in some developing countries,” added Cassie Phillips, vice president, Sustainable Forests and Products at Weyerhaeuser. “It will cost the global industry economically, but we will all gain in the longer term as illegally sourced wood is removed from the marketplace.”

WRI’s partnership with the EIA arrives at the right time. December 6 is the official “forest day” for delegates at the United Nations climate conference in Poland, where WRI and EIA will both be holding events about the links between deforestation and climate change. Also, the first public comment period on issues relating to implemetation of the Lacey Act, which went into effect on May 22, ends December 8.

Video: Working to Save Central Africa's Forests

Scott Thompson — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 16:52:06 -0400

WRI began working in Central Africa ten years ago and has since built an extensive on-the-ground presence to contribute to the development of sustainable forest management in the region.

The following video introduction by Pierre Méthot, Program Manager for WRI’s Forest Information and Governance Initiative in Central Africa, is the first in a series of pieces examining WRI’s expanding role in this important region:

Stretching across six countries, the Congo Basin contains the second largest contiguous tropical forest in the world and is home to a wealth of biodiversity and wildlife populations. In addition to serving the livelihoods of the estimated 30 million people living in the region, the Basin’s forests absorb atmospheric carbon, thereby mitigating global warming.

The health of this rich ecosystem, however, is under increasing strain.

Industrial logging is expanding across the region due to mounting local and international demand for the Congo Basin’s forest resources, particularly from Asian markets. Moreover, as continued infrastructure improvements enhance forest accessibility, forest degradation and fragmentation is accelerating in even the most remote areas.

Alongside the Amazon and Southeast Asia, Central Africa has consequently become a focal point for tropical deforestation, which currently accounts for 20% of global carbon emissions. While not yet experiencing the high rates of deforestation seen in the other two regions, Central Africa will likely face similar levels as demand and populations increase.

In August, I traveled to the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo with colleagues in the People and Ecosystems Program to visit our local offices in Kinshasa and Brazzaville and interview regional partners in government, NGOs, civil society, and the private sector.

The experience illuminated both the breadth of WRI’s work as well as the collaborative framework that has been established between WRI and its partners to produce a set of informational tools to support transparency and decision-making processes in order to protect biodiversity, strengthen forest management, and combat the illegal, unsustainable exploitation of forest resources.

To learn more about WRI’s forest work in the Congo Basin and elsewhere around the globe, click here.

Global Leadership on Deforestation and Climate Change

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:12:57 -0400

Two high-level forums recently convened in Washington D.C. to deal with some of the most challenging forestry and climate change issues facing the international community.

The World Bank hosted the Global Forest Leaders Forum on Forests and Climate Change (co-chaired by WRI), part of a process to give voice to the world’s forests and the people who depend on them.

Separately, UNDP, FAO and UNEP hosted a workshop on REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation). The workshop’s objective was to develop guidelines for monitoring, assessment and verification, that would support ways to address REDD in international negotiations and agreements, in particular the UNFCCC process.

WRI Background and Reports

Groundbreaking Study Finds the "Hotspots" Most Responsible For Deforestation

Fred Stolle — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:48:30 -0400

A new study by WRI and other researchers finds that much of the world’s deforestation is isolated in a handful of “hotspots,” not spread out over many nations and many locations. In fact, this study showed that over half the world’s deforestation (in this study only clear-cut are monitored) is happening in just two locations: 48% is occurring in Brazil, with another 13% concentrated in Indonesia. Meanwhile, deforestation in Africa is negligible in comparison.

The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), uses a completely new method of combining satellite systems to pinpoint changes and calculate the area of change over the entire tropics.

The methodology is unique because unlike previous studies, it uses a classification system that is free of human bias or methodological variance. Instead, it brings a uniform approach to tropical wide deforestation assessments that can be done in a timely, accurate and consistent manner over wide swaths of humid tropical zones.

The results show the enormity of the problem, but they are nonetheless encouraging. Policymakers, now armed with the knowledge of where these hotspots are, can use the data to make better-informed decisions about how to stop deforestation in their areas.

These findings are especially important for the current negotiations of the climate change agreement in 2012 in which forest will play a major role in the so called REDD mechanism (“Reduced emission from deforestation and forest degradation” in developing countries). Deforestation and land use change is responsible for almost 20% of the world’s emissions. Forests are therefore both part of the problem–and a major part of the solution–to combating climate change. The study will be important to the current negotiations and demonstrate the need for Brazil and Indonesia to be included and play a major role in a future climate agreement that includes forests.

A New Way to Track Changes in Forest Cover

The NAS study shows tropical deforestation with “unprecedented accuracy.” Previous studies of tree cover loss, such as those done by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, often relied on country-supplied data that was often unverifiable or not granular enough to isolate the worst-hit areas. In contrast, the satellite imagery used in this study is collected independently and consistently across countries and regions.

The study used medium resolution (500m) satellite imagery from the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) to pinpoint the “hotspots.” Detailed (30m) Landsat satellite images, like the ones shown below, are then used to calculate forest cover loss between 2000 and 2005. The tandem method has the great advantage to cover wide swath of areas and still come up with detailed results on area of change. Both results are important to pinpoint where conservation efforts should be concentrated. Plus, as the report points out, satellite monitoring can be done at “a fraction of the cost of obtaining extensive ground inventory data.”

Examples of Landsat Sample Blocks: Malaysia

Lead author Matthew Hansen of South Dakota State University (SDSU) explained how the study will improve our knowledge of deforestation dynamics. “We need operational systems that efficiently and accurately allow us to monitor forests,” Hansen said. “Consistency is paramount. Currently, we have to compare various estimates from results reflecting different periods, different study areas, different definitions and different methods. Our approach is meant to be repeatable and to cover the whole biome, which we think is an advance. Our method to could be implemented retrospectively and prospectively in monitoring change over time.”

The method described in this article were previously used by the Indonesian government in cooperation with WRI, SDSU and other organizations (e.g. World Bank, Sekala a local NGO) in a project called FOMAS (Forest Monitoring and Assessment System) that for the first time showed the changes in forest cover on an archipelago wide scale between 2000-2005. The result of this study has been used by the Indonesian government in their assessment of green-house-gas emissions from deforestation.

The “Hotspots”: Brazil and Indonesia

The majority of tropical deforestation is occurring within a few specific regions:

55% of clearing occurred within only 6% of the world’s forest areas.
Just two countries–Brazil and Indonesia–accounted for just over 60% of the world’s forest loss. In both countries, forest loss is largely confined to a single state or region.
Within Indonesia, deforestation was highly concentrated in two specific areas of peatland.

Forest Clearing and Forest Cover in the Humid Tropical Forest Biome: 2000-2005

As the report points out, the numbers “reveal a higher degree of regional variation in forest clearing than currently portrayed.” In particular, the study found the worst deforestation took place in Latin America and Asia, while Africa accounted for only 5.4% of total tree clearance.

The report “may hold unexpected benefits for conservation,” co-author William Laurance, a tropical forest researcher at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, said. For example, the study can show when, where and suggest why deforestation is taking place. And because forest loss appears to be much more concentrated than previously believed, it may be possible to drastically reduce deforestation by focusing efforts on a few critical regions. Using this data, advocates and government officials can now target their efforts to stop deforestation more accurately.

Learn More

You can find about WRI’s efforts using satellite imagery to monitor tree cover loss in our report, “Painting the Global Picture of Tree Cover Change: Tree Cover Loss in the Humid Tropics.” And read several case studies WRI has produced on tree cover loss in Brazil, Cambodia, Central Africa and Indonesia.