Press release. Buenos Aires, 9 November 1998. NGO Forest Working Group expresses strong concern about inclusion of forests in the Clean Development mechanism.
The NGO Forest Working Group, an informal coalition of NGOs, which has been following intergovernmental negotiations relating to forests since 1995, has expressed strong concerns about the potential inclusion of forestry and land use change in the Clean Development Mechanism established by the Kyoto Protocol. One of their main concerns is that this inclusion will lead to a strong increase in large-scale monoculture tree plantation development in developing countries: Large-scale plantation development is increasingly becoming one of the most important causes of the destruction of native forests and other natural ecosystems. These plantations tend to have very negative social and environmental consequences for local communities, as they deprive them from their land and livelihood.