My estimate (from comparing reference levels with projected levels over the current commitment period) is that the worst offender in absolute terms is Russia. The worst in relative terms are New Zealand and Norway - with Norway’s accounting giving it about half of its proposed 40% reduction But credit is still due for at least proposing a 40% reduction.

I plan to write a blog post on this soon. It would be good to get more detail on Russia’s reference level. At Copenhagen the proposed a ‘range’.

SAVE THE FOREST-SAVE THE EARTH!

[...] Sources: Cheating Countries Threaten Efforts to Save Forests: http://adoptanegotiator.org/2010/06/05/cheating-countries-threaten-efforts-to-save-forests/ [...]

You don’t have the faintest idea about the Finnish forestry!

I really don’t get the issue here. I want to give the signal that in order to support an issue, I need some more/other information to get convinced. How will this loop-hole affect the amount of forests in rich countries? And in poor countries? Which countries are considered rich or poor (China, Brazil)? Or is it merely a plea in favour of the development of this global carbon-emmision-bureaucracy (of which I am not very convinced)?
Yours truely
JH

The credibitility of Greenpeace and Avaaz depends on providing a reasoned argument. The information provided on the forestry ‘loophole’ is more rant than reason. It does no one any good. Please do not joint the red-top media: there are other ways in showing committment to reducing injustice. Please provide balanced facts - these things are rarely as simple as you make out. To take just one example, your assertion that “Forest management and land use are the biggest areas of potential for mitigating climate change” is far from self-evident, this only being true if you rule out a drastic change in fossil fuel usage or no ‘natural’ move into the next glacial episode. Distilled down, it appears that your key assertion is that the ‘cheaters’ are trying to “hide emissions from bio-energy”. Bio-energy may produce a transient carbon deficit, but, integrated over the time-scale of most CO2 reduction strategies, is neutral. We need to convince people to support forest eqilibrium or growth on a better argued basis.

It seems like you have not knowledge what so ever of Swedish forestry. This country does not take out/cut down more forests than it replants. But looka at Brazil and Malaysia, where the amounts of forests are dwindling down every years. The Scandinavian countries have no reason at all to cut down forests unnecessary.
First, the population is very small and we do not to cit down forest to create cattle land (like in Brazil) or to grow other crops. And the population is moving into the cities at continuesly.
Second, replanting of areas which have been cut down is mandatory.
Third, why should these countries cut down more forests than it can afford, when it is one of the biggest export earners of these countries? If we cut down too much we will ourself suffer from this.

This time the this organisation and Avaaz organisation seem to have done their homework very sloppy.
If you want people to engage in action, then you first must have all facts righr först. The explanation in the article is not enough. More details are necessary to avoid confusion för the reader.

Please, protect our forests for us and for our children!

Please ensure the conservation of all forests to save us all on earth. If the forests go we - the human race and all animals - will also eventually die.

I too am somewhat confused about this article. More details about these loopholes are required, in order to provide a reasoned arguement, that people can sign up to.

It seems to me that there are two distinct arguments here. The fact that developed countries are not stripping forests in order to create farming isn’t relevant to any move that may be taken to reduce their commitment to sustaining or increasing forestation. It remains clear that forests and woodlands are major means of carbon capture and reductions. What isn’t clear is how the actions that are planned, and being described as a loophole, will affect the degree of carbon capture. As a point of principle for me, we should not reduce the total area of forest and woodland: I am a member of the Woodland Trust which is trying to increase the woodland in the UK. But if some of the countries referred to are reducing the degree of forestation - as is denied most unhelpfully by other message posters, who don’t explain why the Avaaz statements are inaccurate, but state that they are - then it is difficult to be sure. I think I will sign the petition in order to emphasise the importance of sustaining the forests, but would appreciate more clarity on both sides of the argument.

I fully agree with Nigel Bennett !
I will also sign but hope that ‘not convincing and/or not clear’ statements and requests for support will damage the right cause

[...] Comment les tricheries des pays menacent les efforts de protection des forêts (en anglais): http://adoptanegotiator.org/2010/06/05/cheating-countries-threaten-efforts-to-save-forests/ [...]

While I support and sign this issue in principal, there is a problem:-

Many forests are grown as a harvest for profit, because the world uses a lot of timber, for eg building houses etc.

This wood for building, is relatively carbon neutral, compared with using bricks or steel or concrete, fired with excessive amounts of fossil fuels, releasing CO2.

Finland and Canada, Scandinavian, and many other countries harvest trees.

In the UK in 14c the poor had to change from wood fires to coal, because of a shortage of trees,despite managed coppicing to quickly grow firewood.

The big manor houses expected a large forest of trees, for harvesting, for house building, ships, and heating and cooking, and early industrial use.

When the Duke of Wellington won the battle of Waterloo, the grateful British people gave him a large country estate, (Stratfield Saye, nr Reading). this had a rather inadequate house, which he happily lived in without rebiulding, but a large forest of trees which he harvested, as a cash crop.

Wood fired heating stoves, are considered a more sustainable, low CO2 emitting way of heating our homes, subject to adequate managed supplies of trees. Better than gas or oil fired boilers, especially as these fossil fuels are peaking now, leading to rocketing prices shortly, and little left for our childrens children.

We must differentiate between profiteering tree clearance, and responsible managed tree harvesting. Any harvesting of trees now must be managed in a sustainable way, including ensuring adequate re-planting after harvesting.
Tony Edwards RIBA

Looks like some people here do not see much difference between the relative contributions of forest quantity vs. quality in mitigating climate change. As you probably all know, not all forest types or stages have the same carbon storage capability. Re-planting trees after cutting (see Sweden, Finland…) is of course a positive move for the very sustainability of the wood resources (and for biodiversity as well on the condition that you replant with native species). But its overall impact on global emissions can be much greater if it is made to replace or alter the best carbon sinks that exist in the landscapes, namely the natural-like old-growth forests and mires. It is not me who is telling it, but it is what you will understand after reading the tens and tens of publications on the topic that have been published in the world’s top scientific journals (Nature, Science, Global Change Biology, etc.) during the last decade.

But this is something that large forestry companies do not like very much to hear in public places, especially when talking about Scandinavian countries and their never satiated appetite for large timber sources like from Russia, the Baltic countries and other few places with still a little bit of pristine forests left (the very last ones we have by the way). Since practically, this would mean that estimating the true contribution of a country to global carbon emissions would also need to take into account the impact of its worldwide forestry activities on the carbon sequestration function of our planet’s key ecosystems, including untouched forests and peatlands. Naturally, this should also apply to emerging economies like China and India, having become the first users of tropical wood and palm oil in addition to their own domestic production of gases. From that perspective indeed, not all the countries are even regarding their international contribution to greenhouse gas emissions from forestry activities, and so is the growing interest to cheat for some of them…This is why I shall support Avaaz’s call for more transparency in climate debate from the forest and political sectors.

Regarding the use of logging remains as a source of bio-energy, the concept in itself seems attractive and can be regarded as a way to promote energy independence. Right. Unfortunately, and I speak here from the forest ECOSYSTEM FUNCTIONING perspective, using wood residues for burning also means less carbon input into the ground from normal decomposition. Besides having long-term negative implications for the forest soil fertility in general (notably by disrupting normal humification and mineralization processes), losses of soil carbon can become a serious issue in places like cold-adapted boreal forests where the temperature sensitivity of the decomposition of the soil organic carbon is actually higher than in warmer places. This means that, in a most likely scenario of soil temperature increases at higher latitudes, an increasing amount of carbon shall be lost from the soils of boreal forests unless the carbon input is increased as well to compensate for the accelerated decomposition. This would need however to slow down with the collect of woody debris in order to produce bio-energy.

Thank you for your time.

Philippe Fayt, Postdoc researcher in forest sciences

For sure they messed up with the campaign. Here explains better:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/08/forest-emissions-bonn-climate-talks
and
http://makeforestscount.org/problem.php

VERY simply cutting down old growth forests and replanting with plantations is not carbon reduction. That is what is happening in the EUropean nations. Look at UPM’s site and that is what they say they do. They do the same in Indonesia by proxy too.

[...] Cheating Countries Threaten Efforts to Save Forests: http://adoptanegotiator.org/2010/06/05/cheating-countries-threaten-efforts-to-save-forests/ [...]

I think some of the previous posts have missed the point here, although there are some great professional clarifications from deforestation pro’s. The point being made isn’t just about deforestation but about the avoidance by some countries, in their accounting principles, of taking into account the deforestation element and therfore carbon sequestration, in net carbon reduction. Please don’t get all nationalist protective on the subject when what is being discussed is the vital NET reduction in carbon emmissions.

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