7. FOREST SECTOR19 Forests constitute both a sink and a source of atmospheric CO2. Forests absorb carbon through photosynthesis, but emit carbon through decomposition and when trees are burned due to anthropogenic and natural causes. Managing forests in order to retain and increase their stored carbon will help to reduce the rate of increase in atmospheric CO2 and stabilize atmospheric concentrations. Even though some degraded lands are unsuitable for forestry, there is considerable potential for mitigation through improved management of forest lands for carbon conservation, storage and substitution, in balance with other objectives. This section describes national forest practices and measures and international projects and programmes that may be successfully pursued to achieve this goal.20 Forests currently cover about 3.4 Gha worldwide, with 52% of the forests in the low latitudes (approximately 0-25°N and 'S latitude), 30% in the high latitudes (approximately 50-75°N and S latitude), and 18% in the mid-latitudes (approximately 25-50°N and °S latitude) (SAR II, 24.2.1). The world's forests store large quantities of carbon, with an estimated 330 Gt C in live and dead above- and below-ground vegetation, and 660 Gt C in soil (mineral soil plus organic horizon) (SAR II, 24.2.2). An unknown quantity of carbon also is stored in products such as wood products, buildings, furniture and paper. Forest management practices that can restrain the rate of increase in atmospheric CO, can be grouped into three categories: (i) management for carbon conservation; (ii) management for carbon sequestration and storage; and (iii) management for carbon substitution. Conservation practices include options such as controlling deforestation, protecting forests in reserves, changing harvesting regimes, and controlling other anthropogenic disturbances, such as fire and pest outbreaks. Sequestration and storage practices include expanding forest ecosystems by increasing the area and/or biomass and soil carbon density of natural and plantation forests, and increasing storage in durable wood products. Substitution practices aim at increasing the transfer of forest biomass carbon into products rather than using fossil fuel-based energy and products, cement-based products and other non-wood building materials. The potential land area available for the implementation of forest management options for carbon conservation and sequestration is a function of the technical suitability of the land to grow trees and the actual availability as constrained by socioeconomic circumstances. The literature reviewed for the SAR (SAR II, 24.4.2.2) suggests that globally 700 Mha of land might be available for carbon conservation and sequestration (345 Mha for plantations and forestry, 138 Mha for slowed tropical deforestation, and 217 Mha for natural and assisted regeneration). Table 14 provides an estimate of global potential to conserve and sequester carbon, based on the above studies. The tropics have the potential to conserve and sequester the largest quantity of carbon (80% of the total potential), followed by the temperate (17%) and the boreal zones (3%). Natural and assisted regeneration and slowing deforestation account for more than half of the amount in the tropics. Forestation and agroforestry contribute the remaining tropical sink, and without these efforts regeneration and slowing deforestation would be highly unlikely. Scenarios show that annual rates of carbon conservation and sequestration from all of the practices mentioned increase over time (SAR II, 24.4.2.2). Carbon savings from slowed deforestation and regeneration initially are the highest, but from 2020 onwards plantations sequester practically identical amounts as they reach maximum carbon accretion (see Figure 3). On a global scale, forests turn from a global source to a sink by about 2010, as tropical deforestation is offset by carbon conserved and sequestered in all zones. Using the mean cost of establishment or first costs for individual options by latitudinal region, the cumulative cost (undiscounted) for conserving and sequestering the quantity of carbon shown in Table 14 ranges from about $250-300 billion at an average unit cost ranging from $3.7-4.6h C (SAR II, 24.5.4). Average unit cost decreases with more carbon conserved by slowing deforestation and assisting regeneration, as these are the lowest cost options. Assuming an annual discount rate of 3%, these costs fall to $77-99 billion and the average unit cost falls to $1.2-1.4/t C. Land costs and the costs of establishing infrastructure, protective fencing, education and training are not included in these cost estimates. While the uncertainty in the above estimates is likely to be high. the trends across options and latitudes appear to be sound. The factors causing uncertainty are the estimated land availability for forestation projects and regeneration programmes, the rate at which tropical deforestation can actually be reduced, and the "This section is based on SAR II, Chapter 24, Management of Forests for Mitigation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions (Lead Authors: S. Brown, J. Sathaye, M. Cannell and P. Kauppi). 20Mitigation technologies, policies and measures to reduce GHG emissions from grasslands, deserts and tundra are still in their infancy, and mitigation options in these sectors have yet to be evaluated in depth; hence, these are not addressed in this report. 56 Technologies. Policies and Measures for Mitigating Climate Change Table 14: Global carbon that could be sequestered and conserved, and related costs (1995–2050). • Establishment or first cost (undiscounted). Average of estimates reported in the literature. Most estimates do not include land, infrastructure, protective fencing, education and training costs. Figures in parenthesis indicate the range of cost estimates. * Cost figures in column 4 are per t of vegetation C. Total costs (column 5) are thus lower than the figure obtained by multiplying t C in column 3 by S/t C in column 4. causing deforestation in much of the tropics (SAR II, 24.3.1.1). In Brazil, on the other hand, wealthier investors are major agents of deforestation, clearing land for cattle ranches that often derive part of their financial attractiveness from land speculation. Both forest-related and non-forest measures and policies have contributed to deforestation. These include short-duration contracts that specify annually harvested amounts and poor harvesting methods, which encourage contractors to log without considering the concession's sustainability. Royalty structures that provide the government with too little revenue to permit reforestation adequate for arresting forest degradation after harvesting also lead to deforestation. Non-forest policies that lead to direct physical intrusion of natural forests are another prime cause of deforestation. These include land tenure policies that assign property rights to private individuals on the basis of "improvement” through deforestation, settlement programmes, investments promoting dams and mining, and tax credits or deductions for cattle ranching. Table 15 shows the measures whose successful implementation would slow deforestation and assist regeneration of biomass. Each of these measures will conserve biomass, which is likely to have a high carbon density, and will maintain or improve the current biodiversity, soil and watershed benefits. The capital costs of these measures are low, except in the case of recycled wood, where the capital cost depends on the product being recycled. The first two measures are likely to reduce sectoral (agricultural) employment as deforestation is curtailed. If the subsidies are gainfully invested, they have the potential to create jobs Technologies, Policies and Measures for Mitigating Climate Change elsewhere in the economy to offset this loss. Sustainable forest management has the potential to create economic activity and employment on a long-term basis. The implementation of forest conservation legislation requires strong political support and may incur a high administrative burden. Removing subsidies may run into strong opposition from vested interests. Jointly implemented projects have been slow to take off as the perceived transaction costs are high and financing is difficult to obtain when carbon sequestration is the main benefit. Although sustainable forest management is politically attractive, its implementation requires local participation, the establishment of land tenure and rights, addressing gender and equity issues, and the development of institutional mechanisms to value scarcity; the combination of these factors may incur high administrative costs. 57 high, and there are countries, such as Brazil, India and Thailand, where governments have adopted explicit measures and policies to halt further deforestation (SAR II, 24.3.1.1). For instance, in June 1991, the Brazilian government issued a decree (No. 151) suspending the granting of fiscal incentives to new ranching projects in Amazonian forest areas in order to further decrease the annual rate of deforestation (which, as a consequence of economic recession, had reduced to 1.1 Mha for 1990-91 from 2 Mha/yr during 1978-88). The long-term impact of this decree is not yet known, but additional measures could be applied if necessary. LAL 40+ 20+ 1.0t 0.5 Figure 3: Average annual rates of carbon conservation and sequestration per decade through implementation of forest management options listed in Table 14: (a) by four countries or regions of the high- and mid-latitudes with the highest total sequestration rates, (b) for the three tropical (Tr.) regions, (c) latitudinal region, and (d) forest management practice. Note that Defor = deforestation and Regen = natural and assisted regeneration (SAR II, 24.4.2.2, Figures 24-1 and 24-2). 58 Technologies. Policies and Measures for Mitigating Climate Change Table 15: Selected examples of measures to mitigate GHG emissions through slowing deforestation and assisting regeneration. Administrative, Institutional and Political Considerations Administrative/ Institutional Factors - High enforcement burden -Higher transaction costs - Lack of access to appropriate financing Monitoring and verification uncertainty Requires local commitment and participation; better defined tenure rights; explicit consideration of gender and equity issues; and development of institutional mechanisms to value scarcity -Global initiatives such as ITTO can strengthen the sustainable forest management approach Political Factors - Requires strong political support - Strong opposition from vested interests Technologies. Policies and Measures for Mitigating Climate Change approved under the U.S. Initiative on Joint Implementation 7.3.2 Sustaining the programmes, projects and measures that are being implemented to slow deforestation will pose many challenges. In India, declining rural population growth rates have helped policymakers sustain the slowed deforestation rate. Elsewhere, however, the fundamental challenge will be to continue to find an alternative livelihood for forest dwellers or deforesters, which may require integrating dwellers into the urban social fabric of a nation. Deforesters may be drawn to the forest for reasons other than land cultivation, and policymakers need to resort to largely non-forest policies in such situations. Another challenge in the protection of forests and national parks is to increase government budgets allocated for this purpose, which often are inadequate to provide enough forest rangers, and fencing and other infrastructure to halt land encroachment. Forestation 59 Forestation means increasing the amount of carbon stored in vegetation (living above- and below-ground), dead organic matter, and medium- and long-term wood products. This process consists of reforestation, which means replanting trees in areas that were recently deforested (less than 50 years), and afforestation, which means planting trees on areas which have been without forest cover for a long time (for over 50 years). In temperate regions, reforestation rates tend to be high: Canadian reforestation during the 1980s was reported to be 720 000 ha/yr (SAR II, 24.4.1) and U.S. rates have averaged 1 Mha/yr between 1990 and 1995. There are significant afforestation efforts in both tropical and temperate countries. China alone boasts of having planted 30.7 Mha between 1949 and 1990, while India had 17.1 Mha planted by 1989 (SAR II, 24.4; see Box 4). The United States had 5 Mha of forest plantations by 1985, while France has more than doubled its forest area since the beginning of the last century, from 7 to 15 Mha; by 1994, New Zealand was managing 1.4 Mha of planted forest on sustained yield principles. Measures for forestation and agroforestry include: (i) government investment programmes targeted towards these practices on government-owned land; (ii) community forestry programmes that may be supported by government extension services; and (iii) private plantations with financial and other Box 4. India Example Since 1980, the Indian government has pursued a series of policies and programmes that have stabilized its forested area at about 64 Mha, and, as a consequence, forests are estimated to have sequestered 5 Mt C in 1990. Prior to 1980, the government had a priority to increase food production by increasing area under food grains and to distribute land to the landless poor. This had resulted in significant deforestation during the period 1950-1975, when about 4.3 Mha were converted largely to agriculture. The Indian policies and programmes to slow deforestation and assist regeneration include: Policies 1) Forest Conservation Act 1980: This powerful legislation has made it very difficult to convert forest land to other uses. 2) Ban on logging on state-owned primary forests in many states since the mid 1980s. 3) Significant reduction in concessions to forest-wood-based industry and promotion of a shift to farmland for wood raw material. Programm.es 1) Conversion of 15 Mha of forests to protected areas (national parks and wildlife sanctuaries). 2) Joint Forest Management programme where degraded forest lands are revegetated jointly by the local communities and forest department. 3) Reforestation of 18-20 Mha during 1980–95, yielding 58 Mt of industrial and fuel wood. The policies have survived for nearly 15 years, despite a growing population and increasing demand for food and biomass. The Indian government appears to have successfully relied on conservation legislation, reforestation programmes and community awareness to achieve forest conservation. Source: SAR II, Chapters 15 (Box 15.3) and 24 (Section 24.3.1.1). |