CLIMATE CHANGE
Colombian Forest Project
Reaps Credits... and Criticism
By Stephen Leahy*
UXBRIDGE, Canada (Tierramérica) - The "Procuenca
Initiative" in the Andes region of
western Colombia may be the first in the
world to sell certified forest carbon
credits with a biodiversity protection
component. But alarms are sounding about
the potential negative social and
environmental consequences.
Under way since 2001, the programme will
begin to operate in the international
market next year, having received
official registration Apr. 16 under the
Clean Development Mechanism (CDM).
Part of the Kyoto Protocol on Climate
Change, in force since 2005, the CDM
allows industrialised countries to earn
credits for reducing emissions of
greenhouse gases by investing in
projects in developing countries that
expand their capacity to absorb the
carbon emissions.
Procuenca is expected to auction credits
for some 350,000 tonnes of carbon that
has been sequestered since the project
began, initiative director Francisco
Ocampo told Tierramérica through a
translator.
At the current market value of 20
dollars per tonne, the total would be 7
million dollars for a struggling
community, one that is still suffering
from the collapse of coffee prices more
than a decade ago.
"This project demonstrates the
international importance of these
forests for carbon storage," said Ocampo.
The additional trees planted absorb
carbon dioxide from the atmosphere,
retaining it as solid carbon throughout
the tree's life cycle.
Procuenca brings benefits to this area:
its people and its unique biodiversity,
Ocampo added.
However, a 2008 study by the Colombian
non-governmental organisation Censat
Agua Viva, concludes that the project
has "significant negative impacts on
local communities," reduces local
people's autonomy and is a poor way to
conserve biodiversity.
Meanwhile, Conservation International
(CI), a project partner, calls Procuenca
the "Swiss army knife" of conservation
for its multiple benefits.
It "demonstrates climate change
mitigation efforts can also provide
important services such as freshwater
protection, biodiversity conservation
and human well-being," according to a
press release.
So who's right? Maybe everyone.
About 250,000 hectares in the watershed
of the Rio Chinchiná, centred on the
city of Manizales, are included in the
project. Following the collapse of
coffee prices in the late 1990s, the
mainly small landholders in the region
switched to cattle raising, clearing the
forest - which led to erosion and hurt
water sources in both quality and
quantity.
In 2001, the municipal officials of
Manizales, supported by the United
Nations Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO), launched an
ambitious 8.5-million-dollar
reforestation and regeneration effort to
protect and improve their water supply.
"Carbon sequestration was not part of
the initial project," said Mario
Mengarelli, FAO forestry officer for
Latin America, based in Santiago, Chile.
Procuenca was only about economic
development for the local farmers and
proper management of the watershed,
Mengarelli told Tierramérica.
About 4,000 hectares are in plantation
forests of pine, although some areas are
mixed plantation, with crops and include
a large proportion where cattle can
graze.
There are very few plantations of blocks
of trees, none larger than 14 hectares
and most less than 10. The 300 local
farmers and landowners participating in
the initiative decided the locations and
often it is not on their best land, said
Mengarelli.
Over the entire project area is a
patchwork of plantations, assisted
natural regeneration areas that will act
as corridors between remaining forests,
areas fenced off from cattle, and
plantings of native trees at sites more
than 3,000 metres above sea level, he
said.
"There has been a very positive reaction
from the farmers involved," added the
FAO expert.
The notion that the nascent carbon
market could be a new revenue source for
landowners came a little later,
according to Mengarelli.
A survey by Censat Agua Viva of
Procuenca landowners found that some
were unhappy and many were concerned
about the loss of control over their
lands.
The CDM has strict rules about how
plantations are managed, including what
species of trees they can plant or which
fertilisers they can use, acknowledged
Fabio Arjona, Conservation International
director in Colombia.
Registering the project under CDM is
expensive, and Procuenca is funded
through a tariff on Manizales municipal
residents' water bills, Arjona said
through a translator.
The region is rich in biodiversity,
which includes the spectacled bear (Tremarctos
ornatus) and yellow-eared parrot (Ognorhynchus
icterotis). The opportunity to protect
and enhance natural habitat is the
reason CI became involved, he said.
Seventy percent of the revenue from CDM
carbon credits will go to the
landowners, 20 percent to a biodiversity
trust and 10 percent to Procuenca,
Arjona said.
An examination of the landowner
agreements with Procuenca revealed that
some of the lands had been covered by
natural forest, according to the 88-page
report "Implementation of Compensation
Mechanisms for Environmental Services:
The Colombian Procuenca Case," produced
by Censat and the Global Forest
Coalition.
Censat states that of the initial list
of eight tree species reported for the
reforestation project, just four were
native species, and areas that already
had rainforest species were then covered
with exotic species.
Arjona responded that the CDM does not
allow the removal of forests for the
purposes of creating new plantations and
that it uses satellite images to verify
the state of the natural forest.
"If there was natural forest there in
1990, then those lands cannot receive
CDM accreditation," he said.
Censat Agua Viva also charges that many
of the landowners who joined the project
didn't know what they were getting into.
Many farmers were poor, so they were
happy to sign on to something that might
enable them to stay on their land,
according to the survey, which
concluded: "Procuenca is founded on an
unequal relationship."
(*This story was originally published by
Latin American newspapers that are part
of the Tierramérica network.
Tierramérica is a specialised news
service produced by IPS with the backing
of the United Nations Development
Programme, United Nations Environment
Programme and the World Bank.) |
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