DURBAN (4 December 2011)—A new wave of deforestation is sweeping
across Africa, decimating wildlife and threatening the resilience of
its ecosystems to withstand the effects of climate change—especially
in the area of food security, experts said.
“Deforestation rates in Africa… are accelerating,” said Helen Gichohi,
President of the African Wildlife Foundation, during a keynote speech
at Forest Day 5 in Durban on the sidelines of COP17. “The disappearing
forests, the overgrazed rangelands, and conversion to crop agriculture
of grasslands and wetlands that had served as a refuge to drought,
have all diminished the resilience of ecosystems.”
She called for REDD+ funding to move more quickly to save the
continent’s forest. REDD+ stands for reducing emissions from
deforestation and forest degradation. It is a mechanism being
discussed as part of the U.N. climate talks in Durban, which could see
billions of dollars channeled to developing countries to protect their
forests.
Gichohi’s message was echoed by fellow keynote speaker, Bob Scholes of
the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in South
Africa, who said, “The next major wave of deforestation is already
here and it is happening in Africa.”
“If we can do something to influence deforestation we can have a
greater effect on everything than has happened so far under the Kyoto
Protocol,” he said. “This challenge is worth the effort.”
Scholes described the typical pattern of deforestation in Africa:
loggers come into a forest, they chop the large trees and take out the
valuable timber, then charcoal manufacturers remove a large proportion
of the remaining trees, and then low-input, low-output agriculture
arrives, which after a few cycles leaves the land degraded and of
little value to anyone.
“It is urgent to safeguard Africa’s forests, not only because they
slow climate change, but also because they act as a final barrier to
creeping desertification, underpin sustainable agricultural
production, and support the livelihoods of tens of millions of rural
poor,” said Frances Seymour, the Director General of the Center for
International Forestry Research (CIFOR).
In her opening address, Tina Joemat-Pettersson, South Africa’s
Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said, “Climate change
threatens to undermine many of the development objectives of countries
in Africa and in the rest of the developing world, in particular in
the areas of water, energy, health, agriculture and forestry.”
Scientists have warned that sub-Saharan Africa may be among the
hardest hit regions by climate change. The continent has already been
struck by a string of climate-related disasters, most recently the
drought-induced famine in the Greater Horn of Africa. Experts say
forest destruction and other forms of human-caused land degradation
have transformed vast areas of once grazeable and farmable land into
barren landscapes.
Gichohi said that 9 percent of forest cover has been lost between 1995
and 2005 across sub-Saharan Africa, representing an average loss of
40,000 square kilometres of forest per year. For example, Kenya has
lost the majority of its forest cover to settlements and agriculture,
leaving only 1.7 percent of its land still forested.
“Forests cannot be sustained if people are hungry or governance of
natural resources is inadequate,” said Rachel Kyte, Vice President of
Sustainable Development at the World Bank. “Hunger places a direct
burden on forests when people are forced to push deeper into forested
areas to grow crops… or resort to making and selling charcoal in order
to buy food.”
With declining conditions in forests looming as a threat to climate
health and the wellbeing of a billion impoverished people, the world’s
largest consortium of agricultural researchers announced at Forest Day
the launch of an ambitious global research program devoted to forests
and agroforestry. The program will have an initial three-year budget
of US$233 million. The CGIAR research program on Forests, Trees, and
Agroforestry aims to reinvigorate efforts to reduce deforestation and
forest degradation and expand the use of trees on farms.
The initiative includes a focus on the critical importance of forests
as natural “carbon sinks” that can help slow the pace of climate
change and the need to conserve forest biodiversity. CGIAR experts
believe that improved management of forests and trees can play a wider
role in reducing risks for smallholder farmers and improving the
well-being of forest-dependent communities, particularly women and
other disadvantaged groups.
Current state of REDD+ and forests at COP17
The current state of climate negotiations, in particular around REDD+
and its implementation and the drivers of deforestation, were a major
focus of discussions at the event. Although agriculture is
acknowledged as a driver of deforestation in the current REDD+ draft
text under discussion by the UNFCCC, more should be done to integrate
agricultural and forest mitigation through a joint “landscape
approach.”
Channeling the legacy of the late Wangari Maathai, Africa’s first
Nobel Peace Laureate and a champion for the environment, conveners
screened a video challenging the global forest community to act boldly
to diminish the threat of climate change.
“It is the people who must save the environment. It is the people who
must make the leaders change. So we must stand up for what we believe
in and we cannot be intimidated,” Maathai was quoted as saying in the
film.
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Forest Day is convened by the Center for International Forestry
Research on behalf of the Collaborative Partnership on Forests. The
year’s event is hosted jointly with the Government of South Africa,
through the Department of Agriculture, Forestry & Fisheries. It
attracted more than 1,000 people, including more than 200 climate
change negotiators. For more information, visit www.ForestDay.org.
The Collaborative Partnership on Forests (CPF) is a voluntary
arrangement among 14 international organisations and secretariats with
substantial programmes on forests (CIFOR, FAO, ITTO, IUFRO, CBD, GEF,
UNCCD, UNFF, UNFCCC, UNDP, UNEP, ICRAF, WB and IUCN). The CPF’s
mission is to promote the management, conservation and sustainable
development of all types of forest and strengthen long-term political
commitment to this end.
The Department of Agriculture, Forestry & Fisheries strives towards a
leading, dynamic, prosperous and people-centered sector. Their values
are to deliver excellent service, establish a dedicated workforce and
to focus on people and rural development. The Department as the
custodian of South Africa’s forests aims to ensure sustainable
management of these resources to realise their social, environmental
and economic benefits.
The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) advances human
wellbeing, environmental conservation and equity by conducting
research to inform policies and practices that affect forests in
developing counties. CIFOR helps ensure that decision-making that
affects forests is based on solid science and principles of good
governance, and reflects the perspectives of developing countries and
forest-dependent people. CIFOR is one of 15 centres within the
Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research.