Wood for the trees?
Posted on 07. Jun, 2010 by annac in United Kingdom
This pattern was created by logging tracks in Sweden!
Trees are a bit of a special interest of mine…
When I say that I mean I like them…a lot….
Trees and more importantly forests are vital to fighting climate change. And trees have been a hot issue here at the UN climate talks over the last week. Josh gives you all the details here.
But in a nutshell developed countries want to cheat on their emission reduction targets by setting rules here for their forests that would allow them to actually increase their emissions instead of decreasing them.
Set rules which basically allow them to continue logging and chopping down forests.
Set rules which basically mean they are fiddling the books.
It’s literally this simple, yet no one here is really doing anything to stop this happening. So far we have only got as far as developing countries insisting that if developed countries are going to cheat they have to tell us all they have. It’s crazyness and yet we may soon be locking things like this into place.
When I take a step back from it all though to me it seems like they seem to not be able to see the wood for the trees.
As I said, I like trees…a lot….
Forests are vital to our efforts to fight climate change. But forests are more than just that.
Forests are so much more than just carbon.
Forests are biodiversity, they are beautiful amazing places. Forests are homes, they are the livelihoods for millions of people around the world.
Forests are life.
Sometimes I sit in these rooms and I get so angry. Because the people here seem to have forgotten that.
LULUCF, loopholes, logging….
When these are the words we use to talk about forests no wonder we think it’s ok to let dodgy rules pass, to sign off on rules that allow logging.
It’s time to take a step back and remind ourselves what these discussions are really about.
LULUCF = Land use, land use change and foresty. But so much more than that LULUCF means forests in developed countries.
LULUCF means equity.
LULUCF means justice.
It’s time we all saw the wood not just the trees, and remembered what we ALL have to loose from developed countries fiddling the books.
Do keep an eye on the happenings in Cameroon as “the Baka, Bagyeli and Bakola peoples fear that climate change mitigation projects will further exclude them from their forest homes and that climate change is already affecting their forests.” A complete article can be found at http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/6227