Dear Readers”
There is big news from Nepal this month. A US$95″000 Forest Carbon Trust will reward local communities for successfully increasing carbon stocks for the first time in the country.
Meanwhile” as Indonesia moves ahead with REDD and a two-year logging moratorium” reporters are beginning to look at the effects of these plans on local communities. Mongabay finds that the moratorium allows exceptions for industrial concessions but not for community forests” and the Jakarta Post reports that communities in Central Kalimantan are calling to stop a REDD project to which they did not consent.
At RECOFTC” we're pleased to announce the release of our Training Courses Catalog” with 17 programs available for the upcoming year” as well as a new publication evaluating a pilot program on Payments for Environmental Services in Vietnam.
Until next month”
Alison Rohrs
Editor” People and Forests E-News
Brunei Darussalam: Forest Loss One of Lowest Among ASEAN Nations
Brunei Times” 23 June 2011
A new study by RECOFTC” the ASEAN Social Forestry Network” and SDC shows the Philippines and Vietnam were the only countries in the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to record positive changes in their forest cover from 2005 to 2010. Within the region” Brunei and Lao PDR have comparatively low deforestation rates” while Cambodia and Myanmar’s forest cover has disappeared most quickly.
Related Articles:
Publication on Social Forestry in ASEAN Launched (Borneo Bulletin)
Community Involvement Key to Forest Management (Brunei Times)
Publication on Forests” Climate Change Talks Launched (Brunei Times)
Cambodia: Battle of the Jungle
Thirteen community forests in Cambodia's Oddar Meanchey province — spread over a total of 68″000 hectares — are being registered with climate-change groups as a bank for carbon credits. Throughout the province” the auction of public resources has left residents ever-shrinking space for their livestock to graze and to harvest forest products.
Indonesia: Indigenous Groups Call for Halt to REDD Pilot Project
Indigenous communities in Central Kalimantan are calling on the government to stop a pilot REDD project” fearing that it would prompt conflicts between local groups. People living in and around forested areas in the province said the government did not adequately educate them about the plan and so they could not give their informed consent.
Indonesia: Moratorium Undermines Community Forestry in Favor of Industrial Interests
Community and village forestry licenses are not among the many exemptions granted under the presidential instruction that defines the country’s two-year logging moratorium. The instruction” issued last month” allows exemptions for industrial developers and allows business-as-usual in secondary forest areas by the pulp and paper” mining” and palm oil industries.
Nepal: Communities Successful in Increasing Forest Carbon Stocks
Ekantipur” 14 June 2011
For the first time in Nepal” local communities will be rewarded for successfully increasing forest carbon stocks” which absorb carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A new US$100″000 Forest Carbon Trust Fund will pay forest user groups for managing carbon stocks under REDD+.
Related Publication: Pilot Forest Carbon Trust Fund – Rewarding Local Communities for Forest Conservation (ICIMOD)
Thailand: Local Communities Benefit Economically from Living Near Conservation Areas
Despite the common belief that protected areas economically impoverish communities living adjacent to them” a surprising study shows that” at least in Thailand and Costa Rica” protected areas actually boost local economies and decrease poverty. In these two countries” eco-tourism brings more income to forest communities” although protected areas often deny local people access to land and resources.
Vietnam: New Road Now Path to Forest Destruction
Vietnam News” 14 June 2011
A road completed four years ago has lured farmers who have cleared hundreds of hectares of evergreen forest in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong's Lac Duong District. Farming needs have pushed up prices of land along the road” and deforestation has escalated as a result.
International: Misconceptions about Forest Dwellers Overturned
A new study by CIFOR and the Poverty and Environment Network rejects common claims that poor residents cause most deforestation. It provides solid evidence for the importance of forests to the world's rural poor and overturns some existing assumptions” including that richer households are most likely to contribute to deforestation.
Read the rest of the newsletter here.