What is the Rainforest Alliance doing to promote forest conservation in Guatemala, and throughout Central and South America?
We’re promoting responsible forest management through Forest Stewardship Council certification. In addition, we are supporting forest-dependant communities and helping them to access better market opportunities and diversify their value-added forest products supply. It’s evident that community-managed forests are better at promoting conservation and reducing deforestation. How are communities benefiting from responsible forest management? The communities are able to access more lucrative markets, diversify their income streams, and explore new opportunities, such as environmental services payments (predominately for forest-based carbon sequestration). Carbon fixing services are now considered a promising activity, since the United Nations Convention on Climate Change recognized that forests do play a very important role in mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. This creates great opportunities for the compensation of forest management as an environmental service.
