Money in trees: one deal Copenhagen could reach

As Copenhagen moves towards an angry climax, with the threat of mass protests by climate change campaigners at the lack of progress on a carbon emissions agreement, there is hope on another front. Negotiators are reportedly close to completing a deal that will compensate countries for preserving forests and other natural landscapes including swamps, peat bogs and other pastures that are effective in absorbing carbon dioxide.

While the precise economics of the agreement are still vague, negotiators believe the agreement may be the most significant
achievement to come out of the Copenhagen.

The unique arrangement, called Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation or REDD, is among the first to value the conservation of natural assets based on their contribution to reducing carbon emissions.

"It is likely to be the most concrete thing that comes out of Copenhagen – and it is a very big thing," Fred Krupp, head of the Environmental Defence Fund, told the New York Times. For poor countries, payments will provide new income while still
preserving the rights of indigenous people.

Forests "have become a pot of money or a get out of jail free card," says Peg Putt of the Wilderness Society. "Either way, there's the prospect of financial benefit now, as opposed to just being told, ‘Do the right thing,' like it was two years ago."

The plan, says the New York Times, is an important improvement on the 1997 Kyoto protocol in which poor but richly forested countries received no benefit from maintaining their land.

The payment system will require environmentalists to assess the carbon storage capacity of a wide variety of land use and vegetation. "We're not sure in Copenhagen there will be a definitive mechanism for monetising forests but if there is we think all forests should be included," Steve Kallick, director of the Boreal Conservation Pew Environment Group. The group believes boreal forests store twice as much carbon dioxide per unit as tropical forests.

Others point out that if countries are remunerated for preserving land use, what about the oceans?  "It would be a travesty if Copenhagen addressed forests but not other carbon stocks," said Dan Lafolley of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's World Commission on Protected Area.

While there has been progress on the REDD program, many negotiators are now reported to have abandoned hope on achieving any treaty on cutting carbon emissions worldwide. A top United Nations official, asked to characterise the state of the talks, said simply: "Terrible." ·