TV programme announces that Amazon-based property firms are selling land to Europeans to which they potentially have no entitlement, for a fraction of its real value.
Even the most simple business transactions demand a knowledge of a few key things: what you are buying, why you are buying it, and how much it will cost you. Dutch TV programme Keuringsdienst van Waarde asked just those questions, making a purchase within one of the most complicated markets in the world: carbon offsetting.
The journey begins in the Netherlands as the team make an estimate of the total carbon emissions of their audience. To offset these emissions they decide to buy 43 hectares, or 70 football fields’ worth of forest in Brazil’s Pará state. Arriving in Belén, the team meet with private firm Brazil Property Group, who offer them a “special deal” on primary forest, for a staggering 250 real – or one cent – per square metre.
“The cheap price we were offering was just to get our name out there,” said BPG’s Michael Greene. “People were calling us right after the show asking for the same price, but we only offered them the standard.” Working it out on a calculator, that would be about three cents per square metre, he says.
Having worked with a landowner for more than 3 years, Greene’s firm has a total of 700,000 hectares in the Brazilian Amazon. Around 1,000 are already a part of the carbon credits scheme, but if things keep going as they are, he explains, the whole lot will eventually get sucked in.
In most of these places indigenous peoples have not had their land recognized. “It’s just been taken from them,” says FERN’s Jutta Kill, “by speculative land sellers and companies selling land in the Amazon.” Olga Ramos de Castro, an Amazon sociologist from the University of Pará is also quick to condemn this model. “The chances are the team made a false purchase in the first place,” she says. “Either the piece of land doesn’t exist – it’s an imaginary piece of land – or it is a symbolic sale of emissions allowances from contributions to the forest’s preservation.”
Greene, however, says that if it’s not taken and protected by carbon companies like Brazil Property Group, it will simply be cut down by locals or claimed for deforestation by other Brazilian ranchers. “Most land owners will kick the Indians off or kill [them] when they wander on.” The land is worth more as it’s high risk, he continues, as the parcels are just north of what he terms the “Anapu devastation area, “which the government flooded with poor people. It’s the poor people who were moved there by the government. They are the culprits for the deforestation,” he says.
There is now an ongoing process, explains Ramos, particularly by the growth in emissions trading, where the idea is that you can protect forests by carbon trading. Within this system, poor people are the ones who are vilified. “The rights of the people who live here are being restricted and they are labelled as criminals. In between are the well-meaning Europeans and the middle class who believe that with the pieces of land that they buy, the forest can be saved.”
For a full English transcript of the show, visit REDD-Monitor.
Wednesday 11 May 2011
Tuesday 3 May 2011
Ecuador leads way in development of South American Tropical Research
Ecuador is leading the way in the development of South American tropical research, a recently released report from Tropical Conservation Science has found.
While research in the Andes range and the Amazon basin remains “scattered, patchy, and far below its potential,” the significant resources being invested in training young biologists and improving South America's academic infrastructure mean it could eventually overturn Central America's long-standing dominance of tropical biological literature.
Analysing all the scientific programs based in the Amazon or Tropical Andes in the period 1995-2004, the report found that Central America accounted for twice as many papers as the Amazon basin, and for nearly eight times more papers than the entire Andean range.
Three countries—Brazil, Ecuador, and Peru—accounted for 80.4 percent of all Amazonian research. Brazil was the most common base for Amazonian studies (49.0%), followed by Peru (18.9%) and Ecuador (12.5%).
Ecuador, however, far outstripped any other country in the region when the research effort was standardized by area.
Brazil, whose producing the highest amount of scientific material was attributed, in part, to its geographical size, performed worst of all the Amazonian countries in this sense. Had its number of publications per square kilometre matched Ecuador's, the report says, it would have produced more than twice as many articles as all other tropical countries in the world combined between 1995-2004.
As the tropical Andes Amazon region become more regarded locations for tropical research, it is important that scientists diversify their locations to avoid geographical bias, the authors say. One danger is“shifting the focus from a handful of well-studied sites in Mexico, Costa Rica, and Panama to a handful of well-studied sites in South America.
“A working understanding of South America's tropical forests does not require that biologists visit every last creek and hilltop,” it says, “but it does require that they have a clear picture of the biases that derive from the patchwork exploration of the landscape.”
While research in the Andes range and the Amazon basin remains “scattered, patchy, and far below its potential,” the significant resources being invested in training young biologists and improving South America's academic infrastructure mean it could eventually overturn Central America's long-standing dominance of tropical biological literature.
Analysing all the scientific programs based in the Amazon or Tropical Andes in the period 1995-2004, the report found that Central America accounted for twice as many papers as the Amazon basin, and for nearly eight times more papers than the entire Andean range.
Three countries—Brazil, Ecuador, and Peru—accounted for 80.4 percent of all Amazonian research. Brazil was the most common base for Amazonian studies (49.0%), followed by Peru (18.9%) and Ecuador (12.5%).
Ecuador, however, far outstripped any other country in the region when the research effort was standardized by area.
Brazil, whose producing the highest amount of scientific material was attributed, in part, to its geographical size, performed worst of all the Amazonian countries in this sense. Had its number of publications per square kilometre matched Ecuador's, the report says, it would have produced more than twice as many articles as all other tropical countries in the world combined between 1995-2004.
As the tropical Andes Amazon region become more regarded locations for tropical research, it is important that scientists diversify their locations to avoid geographical bias, the authors say. One danger is“shifting the focus from a handful of well-studied sites in Mexico, Costa Rica, and Panama to a handful of well-studied sites in South America.
“A working understanding of South America's tropical forests does not require that biologists visit every last creek and hilltop,” it says, “but it does require that they have a clear picture of the biases that derive from the patchwork exploration of the landscape.”
Wednesday 21 July 2010
First technical meeting of the Interim REDD+ Partnership concludes with snores in Brazilia, amid further criticism from global civil society.
The Partnership, recently established by close to 60 countries at the Oslo Climate and Forest Conference, aims to work bilaterally alongside the UN to provide quick-start financing for REDD in time for
Since the meeting in Brazilia, there have been no official statements and no information has been released on the official website about the progress of the Partnership, other than some tweets from a Brazilian delegate who photographed a Japanese negotiator sleeping, claiming it ‘symbolized the spirit of the meeting.’ He later tweeted that nothing was decided at the meeting, except the need for further discussions.
Even when apparently dormant, the Partnership is still a source of concern for civil society organisations. “Respect for indigenous peoples' rights and support for the implementation of safeguards still under discussion at the UNFCCC are not among the Partnership's principles,” said the Forest People’s Programme, an NGO supporting Indigenous participation in UN-REDD. “The process so far has been evidently lacking in terms of transparency and participation.”
This month’s meeting in Brasilia saw an invite sent to a randomly selected list of 12 organisations only one week before the meeting itself. Three subsequent letters of complaint, signed by 40 organisations, Climate Action Network and WWF, were sent to the Partnership Chairs over the terms on which civil society was asked to participate.
Uproar was also caused at the first Partnership meeting in Paris when the doors were closed to Indigenous Peoples as 64 forest countries and donor governments met in Paris on March 11th to discuss prospects for the future funding of REDD.
The next official technical meeting of the REDD+ Partnership will be held in
Monday 12 July 2010
United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) focuses on restoring degraded ecosystems.
UNEP has released a report underlining the benefits of restoring natural ecosystems. The report advocates that far from being a tax on growth and development, the rehabilitation of nature-based assets will generate jobs, wealth and restoration of multi-trillion dollar services.
The report uses case studies to outline the benefits of forest restoration to biodiversity and conservation and the impacts on human livelihoods and wellbeing. The varied ecosystems of each case study outline the many different benefits which forest restoration could offer.
Instituto Terra, a non-profit organisation that establishes nurseries to replant denuded areas in the Mata Atlantica, is mentioned for its services to biodiversity, water regulation, carbon storage and preventing soil erosion.
Protecting already intact ecosystems is of course the most logical and cost effective strategy in climate change mitigation, yet more than 60 per cent of global ecosystems - from marshes and coral reefs to tropical forests and soils - are already degraded. On this basis, the report says that restoration must now gain an equal importance.
Some of the benefits of
· Increased and higher quality habitats for animals and plants;
· A secure and high-quality supply of water;
· Prevention and reduction of land degradation;
· A secure source of biomass and biofuel energy;
· Environmentally sound and socially acceptable carbon sequestration;
· Adequate and sustainable income and employment opportunities for rural communities;
· Sustainable source of timber for forest industries and local communities;
· Sound return on investment for forestry investors;
· Increased resilience and resistance to climate change;
· Additional sources of non-timber forest products such as medicinal plants and marketable goods;
· Recreation and tourism opportunities;
· Increased property values near restored areas;
· Enhanced economic and environmental security and mitigation of risk form global economic and environmental
Source: Global Partnership on
http://www.ideastransformlandscapes.org
UNEP quer restaurar ecossistemas degradados
Londres - O UNEP divulgou um relatório que dá ênfase aos benefícios de se recuperar ecossistemas naturais. O relatório defende que, longe de ser um imposto sobre o crescimento e desenvolvimento, a recuperação de sistemas naturais vai gerar emprego, riqueza e restauração de serviços de trilhões de dólares. O relatório utiliza estudos de caso para demonstrar os benefícios da restauração florestal para a biodiversidade e conservação e seus impactos para a vida e bem-estar humano. A variedade de ecossistemas apresentados em cada estudo de caso mostram muitos benefícios singulares que a restauração florestal pode oferecer. O Instituto Terra, uma organização sem fins lucrativos que possui viveiros para fazer replantio de áreas degradas na Mata Atlântica é mencionada por seus serviços para com a biodiversidade, regulação da água, estoque de carbono e prevenção de erosão do solo. Proteger ecossistemas intactos é, certamente, a forma mais lógica e com menos custos na estratégia de mitigação das mudanças climáticas, porém mais de 60% dos ecossistemas globais – de áreas pantanosas e recifes de coral até florestas tropicais e solos – já encontram-se degradados. Com base nisso, o relatório afirma que a restauração florestal deve ganhar igual importância para a conservação. (Patrick Bodenham) Baixe aqui o relatório completo
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Wednesday 7 July 2010
Estudo distorcido alimenta debate Código Florestal
Um estudo americano foi utilizado de forma distorcida na tentativa dos ruralistas de alterar o Código Florestal Brasileiro. Divulgado em maio, "Fazendas Aqui, Florestas Lá" trata da agricultura e indústria florestal dos EUA e de sua relação financeira benéfica com a redução do desmatamento em países tropicais. O relatório afirma que acabar com o desmatamento por meio de incentivos dos EUA iria aumentar a receita da agricultura norte americana de U$190 a U$ 270 bilhões de dólares no período de 2012 a 2030. É possível avaliar que a compensação florestal feita com países tropicais ajudariam os EUA a economizarem U$49 bilhões de dólares na redução de custos com energia e fertilizantes.
Glenn Horowitz, diretor Avoided Deforestation Partners (ADP), responsável pelo artigo, aponta que “alguns interesses em relação ao Brasil estão amplamente mal representados no relatório”, e concorda que interesses internacionais irão ferir a agricultura brasileira. O relatório foi escrito para leitores americanos e não deveria significar impactos para o Brasil.
Porém, ‘ruralistas’, grupo de legisladores que defendem interesses agropecuários, estão utilizando os interesses do agronegócio para iniciar disputas no congresso em relação ao Código Florestal Brasileiro que, em seus 45 anos já reportou proteção a 100 milhões de hectares de florestas. Dentro da lei vigente, proprietários de terra no Brasil são obrigados a manter 80% de sua terra intacta, podendo usufruir dos outros 20%. Mudanças na legislação poderiam encolher essa proporção, igualando em 50% áreas protegidas e áreas de uso intensivo.
Logo, interesses internacionais na redução do desmatamento não são relacionados diretamente à mudança do Código, evidenciando, mais uma vez, a distorção política. (Patrick Bodenham)
Para saber mais:
- Leia o estudo
- Organizações ligadas às questões ambientais estão lutando para impedir a implementação do projeto de lei. Veja tentativas de impedir mudanças no Código Florestal Brasileiro AQUI
Sunday 4 July 2010
American study distorted in campaign to allow more deforestation in Brazilia
A study released in May that looks at how U.S agriculture and forest industries will benefit financially from reduced deforestation in tropical countries is being used in the fight to water down the Brazilian Forest Code.
Glenn Horowitz, director of Avoided Deforestation Partners (
The ‘ruralistas’, a group of right-wing legislatures in Brazilia are using agribusiness interests to ignite a firestorm in Congress over part of the 45 year-old Brazilian Forest Code which has reportedly protected over 100 million hectares of forest. Under the current law, Brazilian landowners are allowed to clear 20 percent of their forests but must keep 80 percent in tact. The new bill could shrink that proportion to 50-50.
The report claims that “ending deforestation through incentives in
13 environmental organisations have appealed to their supporters to fight the bill.
http://www.oeco.com.br/salada-verde/24123-mais-um-capitulo-da-guerra-pelo-codigo-florestal-
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