REDD Plus Review: Weekly (or so...) thoughts on all things REDD - Issue #1

In addition to in-depth articles like Top 10 Implications of the American Power Act for REDD (this site's most widely read post to date), I have decided to present from now on a sort of weekly (or so...) compendium of all things REDD. Rather than simply being a collection of links to, and extracts of, articles from around the web (Google News can give you that), each REDD Plus review will consist of a synthesis of the latest key developments from the world of REDD, laced with my own observations and analysis on the significance and trends therein. Sources for the review will include, of course, posts and other new information from around the web but also, and increasingly, posts on this site from registered users such as yourself (you are registered, aren't you?). In addition, I will aim to mix in whatever insights I have been able to gather recently from my professional contacts working on REDD Readiness, carbon projects, etc. All in all, it should add up to a unique blend of REDD information and analysis, one which can serve as a one-stop shop for the busy REDD-o-phile.  So without further ado, here's the very first REDD Review.

To begin by putting things in context: it is nearly two months since an explosion on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico launched one of America's biggest environmental disasters and provided the opening for a national debate on energy and climate in the U.S. And it is well over one month since the American Power Act was introduced into the U.S. Senate, offering one set of policy prescriptions related to that debate, together with a way forward for REDD within a broader U.S. cap-and-trade market. Unfortunately, as of now, the flow of oil in the Gulf continues, while the legislative flow remains fully stanched.

On the brighter side, it's also now a little over three weeks since the conclusion of the Oslo Climate and Forest Conference, the success of which is evidenced by the resulting Interim REDD Plus Partnership document and the combined pledges of some $4 billion that have come thus far out of the Partnership process. A notable highlight of the Conference was the signing of an agreement between Norway and Indonesia on US$1 billion in REDD support, bundled with Indonesia's announcement of a two-year moratorium on conversion of natural forests. Even before the Oslo Conference, the REDD-Plus partnership process was being hailed by Ministers at a meeting in St. Petersburg as a "frontrunner that could provide examples for solutions also on other issues." Indeed, two similar initiatives -- on adaptation and mitigation/MRV -- to be facilitated by partnerships between developed and developing countries, were also launched at the St. Petersburg meeting. Also not to be missed is the Synthesis Report of the REDD+ Financing and Activities Survey,  prepared in the run up to the Oslo Conference.

Finally, it's just over one week since the end of the latest round of UNFCCC talks in Bonn, where, according to IUCN,  "REDD-plus...did not get the attention it deserved ..." (oddly, little else seems to have been written on REDD @ Bonn: to be continued...).

So with the big global meetings behind it, and U.S. climate legislation at an impasse, REDD news and events are coming largely at the level of the tropical forest coutnries themselves. Not surprisingly, in the aftermath of the Oslo meeting in particular, substantial attention is being given to Indonesia. In the last week, the Jakarta Post has presented two almost diametrically opposed views of recent developments in REDD there. Author Julia Suryakusuma presents a skeptical take on Norway's recent REDD deal with Indonesia, given what is widely seen as rampant corruption in Indonesia's forest sector. Meanwhile, Jesse Kuipjer, Executive Board member of the Borneo Initiative, embraces a rather more enthusiastic point of view, beginning with the article's somewhat bombastic title -- "A giant step for mankind." Kuipjer argues that "the eyes of the world are on Indonesia," following that country's recent announcement of a two-year moratorium on conversion of natural forests. He calls the moratorium a "significant and bold decision" that represents "not only one of the most effective ways to curb carbon emissions, but also one of the best fast-track options with immediate results."

A more balanced view of Indonesia's REDD-related politics is provided in a useful article by Rhett Butler on the Mongabay website, titled "Indonesia's plan to save its rainforests." In addition to presenting an overview of the plan, and of the use of Norway's $1 billion commitment to implement it, the article presents a joint interview with Indonesia's two Special Assistants to the President on Climate Change.

In a second example of what may be increasingly polarized views on REDD, leading US environmental groups continue to push back against what they consider to have been unfair reporting by a leading US investigative journalism program, Frontline, in a recent episode titled "The Carbon Hunters."  The Nature Conservancy  and Brazil's Sociedade de Pesquisa em Vida Selvagem e Educação Ambiental (SPVS) have issued a joint response titled: "Biased media reports that present only part of the story cause damage to serious efforts in nature conservation and sustainable development in Brazil." The debate provides a good example of the kind of pressure that TNC and some other major US environmental NGOs have come under in recent years for what is perceived to be an overly accomodating stance towards the corporate and financial powers that be and of the ways in which these NGOs are attempting to defect such criticisms in the case of REDD.

On a somewhat different note, according to an article titled "Deforestation and Malaria in Mâncio Lima County, Brazil," published in the current (June 16, 2010) online issue of the CDC journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, and summarised in Time magazine, a team of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison has found that clearing tropical forest in Brazil's Amazon is associated with a nearly 50 percent in the incidence of malaria. Apparently, forest clearing creates conditions that favors the spread of the mosquito Anopheles darlingi, which transmits the malaria parasite. This finding, if confirmed and generalized, will add an important economic benefit to any cost-benefit calculation of the value of REDD. Gates Foundation, are you listening?