Is Africa prepared for the arrival of funds to slow deforestation?
by Zachary Wells Why Africa? Reducing emissions from avoided deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) represents the frontier of financing for global forest conservation. This December in Copenhagen, forest stakeholders at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) should conclude the two-year path that began in Bali by deciding on a mechanism for reducing green house gas emissions from forest destruction. REDD will provide incentives for slowing deforestation, the root cause of 20% of global green house gas emissions, as part of the post-Kyoto climate agreement. African states stand to be major recipients of REDD funds; a recent report found that the continent is losing forests twice as fast as the rest of the world.1 Perhaps more importantly, project developers will be taking aim at the continent because of low land use values and the cheap relative cost of protection. There are, however, major issues to be resolved before REDD officially begins facilitatin
