Bulletin Issue 125 - December 2007

Being “carbon neutral” seems to have become fashionable. The World Bank, the Vatican, the World Olympics, the Football World Cup, the Body Shop, the Rolling Stones, and a long list of celebrities proclaim themselves to be totally or partially “carbon neutral”. Even Mercedes Benz recently held in California what was described as “the world’s first ever carbon neutral fashion week”! It is therefore understandable that the New Oxford American Dictionary has proclaimed "carbon neutral" as its Word of the Year for 2006.

During the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change held in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007, a number of social movements and groups agreed to establish a coalition called Climate Justice Now! in order to enhance exchange of information and cooperation among themselves and with other groups with the aim of intensifying actions to prevent and respond to climate change.

For the first time in the history of the United Nations Convention on Climate Change, a world wide coalition of women drafted position papers with the women’s and gender perspective on the most pressing issues negotiated at this Convention that took place in Bali, Indonesia from 3 to 14 December. Gender and Climate Change (gender cc), a global alliance of women for climate justice, presented their position papers at a press conference during the Convention and distributed hundreds of copies to government delegates.

For many years, the pulp and paper industry has been trying to paint itself green. No challenge is too big, it seems, for one of the most polluting industries on the planet. Although paper production is a major consumer of energy and a major cause of greenhouse gas emissions, the latest challenge for the industry is to go "carbon neutral". While reducing greenhouse gas emissions may sound like something that we all welcome, this industry-dominated discussion sidesteps the fact that the pulp and paper industry is expanding rapidly, especially in the global South. It also ignores the issue of massive overconsumption of paper in the North. The best way of reducing the impact of the pulp and paper industry is by reducing the amount of paper produced.

In the general public perception, trees are automatically associated with environmental benefits, and there is consumer demand for “cuddly” offset tree-related projects, as opposed to the type of industrial emissions reductions that have dominated the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) market. It is estimated that some 40% of carbon credits generated in the voluntary market comes from tree-related projects. However, forestry projects –and specifically plantations as carbon sinks-- have been largely absent from the “certified” –CDM- carbon market. They still represent a tiny share of the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism trading program.

The Summit of Communities Criminalized for Defending Nature was held last November in Quito, Ecuador. Criminalization is part of a strategy aimed at silencing any protest against the extractive activities of transnational corporations within Ecuadorian frontiers. It would seem that the next accused could be anyone. It is sufficient to raise your voice against the irrationality of global economy.

India's Minister of Tribal Affairs promised on 7.12.2007 to the Indian Parliament that the  Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest Dwellers (Forest Rights) Act 2006 which the parliament approved a year ago, will be notified and implemented from 1.1.2008 onwards.

Old proposals of damming the Lower Mekong River were revived recently. According to press releases from the Thailand-based NGO TERRA, the governments of Lao PDR, Cambodia and Thailand have granted permission to Thai, Malaysian and Chinese companies, to conduct feasibility studies for up to six large hydro dams on the lower Mekong. Ten years ago the projects had been dismissed for their huge cost and potential environmental damage.

The National Legislative Assembly (NLA), set up after the military coup in Thailand last year and due to be disbanded following the general election on 23 December, has, in its dying breaths, approved the long awaited Community Forest Bill. Rather than consolidating the constitutional rights of all communities to manage their forest areas however, the NLA chose instead to exclude the rights of communities who are living outside the “conservation zones” to take part in forest management.

Forestry development in Chile –meaning monoculture tree plantations- is marked by a great imbalance in the distribution of the monetary wealth generated by this industry. The huge profits obtained -subsidized by the Chilean people- enable the economic groups that own these companies to generate enormous wealth, while the population does not receive in exchange any real benefits from this activity. The economic damages produced by environmental disasters are suffered by the affected people (in Río Mataquito, Río Cruces in Valdivia, due to loss of water in planted areas, etc.). For their part, the State and the companies turn a deaf ear on the damage caused by their pine and eucalyptus plantations to the neighbouring and mainly Mapuche communities.

Most Chilean forestry companies’ plantations are certified, some by FSC and the majority by CERTFOR (a member of PEFC). In round figures, FSC has certified some 350,000 hectares, while CERTFOR has certified approximately 1,600,000 hectares. Given the importance of CERTFOR in Chile, it interesting to analyze it in greater detail. The first thing to draw our attention is the total number of hectares certified by CERTFOR, equivalent to almost 80% of the total number of hectares planted in Chile. That is to say that these certified companies are mainly responsible for most of the environmental problems documented in Chile at the level of plantations: destruction of native forests, depletion and pollution of water resources, negative impacts on soils, on flora and on fauna.

The 85,000 hectares territory of Woodlark Island in Papua New Guinea’s Milne Bay Province is almost totally covered by dense lowland rainforest -- lowland dry forest on the eastern side and dense jungle on the western side --which is home to several endemic species. Woodlark Island holds unique ebony species which include dark/black, grey and grey/black varieties, - there are no other forests of this type in the world. Most of the 6,000 island’s inhabitants depend on the available natural environment as well as the marine resources, doing gardening --they mainly plant yams, taro, sweet potatoes, and bananas- as well as fishing and hunting --that play a smaller, though important, role in their diet.

Peter George is a farmer. Or, to be more accurate, he used to be a farmer. He bought Elangeni Farm in the cool highveld of Swaziland in the mid-1970s. He grew vegetables along with some eucalyptus and acacia trees. He drove twice a day to the local market to sell his cabbages. He had a few sheep, chickens, two cows and a half-blind sheep dog. After a few years he started a small fish farm, selling to local restaurants and hotels. He built his own house, got married and started a family.

European politicians want to validate the accelerated introduction of agrofuels into the EU countries establishing supposedly sustainable criteria. However, before making full assessments, consulting with the populations involved and establishing these criteria, the obligatory objectives or percentages of agrofuels to be mixed with fossil fuels have already been fixed. The percentages are so high (5.75% until 2010 and 10% until 2020) that many analyses claim that they are impossible to attain.