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RI wants more green support
The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Wed, 09/26/2007 3:20 PM
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, New York
Indonesia wants more money from developed countries to reforest its lost tropical woodland under the Kyoto Protocol's carbon-trading scheme, despite skepticism the country can sustain green projects given its inability to deal with illegal logging.
Indonesia on Monday hosted on the sidelines of the UN Climate Change Convention a meeting with 10 other tropical rainforest countries.
They issued a joint statement calling for the mobilization of new and additional financial resources to implement non-restrictive policies and positive incentives for forest management and conservation.
The group, which includes more than half of the world's tropical forest, also vowed to enhance sustainable forest management and conservation, and called for protected areas to be given special consideration by the international community.
Addressing the UN convention, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said tropical countries should push for a better price for each ton of carbon saved under the carbon-trading scheme, which calls for compensation from major greenhouse gas emitters in exchange for forest conservation.
""Because these tropical rain forests serve a critically strategic role as our planet's carbon sinks, the so-called 'lungs of the earth', these forestry initiatives deserve stronger support and more meaningful incentives,"" he said.
But Yudhoyono said the meeting did not discuss any specific formula. ""I think that it is only fair if developing nations receive technological assistance and more incentives to make use of the resources that are given, so that we can fulfill our own obligations based on shared but differentiated responsibilities,"" he said.
A ton of reduced carbon dioxide is at present priced at between US$5 and $10. Prices in the European Union's carbon market, the world's largest, stand at between 20 and 25 euros.
The national commission on carbon trading has approved 24 projects, only nine of which have been registered with the UN. Green activists say Indonesia has not been aggressive in pursuing projects compared to other major greenhouse gas emitters, particularly China.
Indonesia is estimated to have the potential to supply 2 percent of the global carbon trading market equivalent of around 125 million tons of carbon dioxide.
On the other hand, reports show Indonesia rapidly losing 1.87 million hectares of forest per year to deforestation and fires.
Forests reduce greenhouse gases by absorbing carbon from the atmosphere.
The government continues to permit land concessions in forests, while more than a dozen mining companies are operating in protected forests.
Legal enforcement and prevention of illegal logging have been half-hearted and sparse, while post-mining reclamation work by mining companies has poorly enforced or monitored.
Indonesia risks some of the major impacts of global warming. Rising sea levels lead to submerged islands, while erratic seasons disrupt agricultural cycles, affecting the basic livelihood for the majority of Indonesians.
Monday's convention served as a starter before the Bali climate conference in December, which will seek to lay the groundwork for a new climate deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol that expires in 2012.
It conveniently followed an agreement reached by the signatories of the Montreal Protocol over the weekend to accelerate the freeze and phase-out of hydrochloroflurocarbons, the chemical compound used for air conditioners and refrigerators which damages the ozone layer and contributes to global warming.
Indonesia ratified the treaty in 1992.
