Guyana Chronicle, 8 January 2008
IN your news article, ‘Market-based reward mechanism for standing
forests – Guyana will advocate at Bali Climate Change Conference’
Guyana Chronicle, 8 December 2008, you reported the position that
Guyana intended to put forward at the UNFCC meeting for compensation
for its standing forests. More recently, SN’s editorial, ‘The Bali Road
Map and its implications for Guyana’ (SN January 4 2008), notes that
Guyana’s own road map should be integrated into the mandates of the
Coalition of Rainforest Nations (CRN), the Association of Small Island
Developing States (AOSIS), and the Centre for International Forestry
Research.
These two ad hoc associations and the international agricultural
research centre will provide inputs into the global effort to develop a
post-2012 successor to the Kyoto Protocol for actions to mitigate and
adapt to the adverse effects of climate change.
In the reports of the working groups which prepared for the Bali
conference the concerns of Guyana seem not to have been presented.
Perhaps Guyana did not send delegates, or its delegates were unable to
present a persuasive and rationalised case. Yet Guyana should have a
good case in relation to rising sea levels, and should be able to
present a comprehensive and costed action plan for re-engineering of
its sea defences and of its drainage and irrigation control systems in
the Water Conservancies. The relevant chapters in the National
Development Strategy 2001-2010 contain the bases for such an action
plan. Is the Ministry of Agriculture working in such an action plan as
its contribution as a member of AOSIS?
The Coalition of Rainforest Nations at Bali was mostly concerned about
extracting cash from major carbon-emitting countries for reduced
emissions from forest burning associated with land clearing for
subsistence and commercial agriculture. As predicted before the Bali
conference, the delegates were little concerned about
difficult-to-measure degradation of standing forest through
poorly-controlled harvesting of timber and other products. REDD –
reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation – is likely to
contract to RED – reducing emissions from deforestation alone. RED
itself would soak up easily the small budget of US$ 100 million for the
“readiness mechanism” in the World Bank-administered Forest Carbon
Partnership Facility. This fund is intended to assist 20 countries to
reduced emissions from deforestation. The Presidential expectation of
receiving REDD -related funding simply for having standing forest not
under threat of deforestation seems to be misplaced (‘Guyana still open
to carbon credits forest deal with UK – President’, SN January 07,
2008), although the Bali decisions included a reference to “enhancing
forest carbon stocks due to sustainable management of forests”.
Instead of looking towards REDD/RED for financial support, Guyana
should take note of a pre-Bali briefing provided by the Royal Institute
for International Affairs in London and the consultancy ProForest in
Oxford UK (ProForest was the consultant advising the Guyana Forestry
Commission (GFC) on a legality assurance scheme for timber exports).
This briefing (http://www.illegal-logging
item=document&item id=560&approach_id=) pointed out that countries with
good forest governance would be well placed to take up post-Bali
funding while countries with a reputation for poor forest governance
would not. The briefing noted that technologies (of the kinds now being
promoted by the GFC – see “GFC integrating bar-coding with its
monitoring methods” SN December 31, 2007) are not a substitute for good
governance. In other words, to be credible and eligible for new donor
funding Guyana (as represented by the GFC) would itself need to engage
in real internal reform.
This reform is not evident. The GFC is ordering the forest product
processors to reform, even though it has not explained publicly the
rationale for such reforms, and is critical of the Press for not
correctly reproducing the instructions (“GFC responds to Kaieteur News
article in standards” Guyana Chronicle January 4, 2008, in response to
“Forestry sector still not fully compliant with new standards” Kaieteur
News January 03 2008).
In this GC article, the GFC reiterates its advice “that the GFC be
contacted for clarity and accuracy”. Here there is a problem, which
presumably potential donors will also note or have noted. The GFC is a
poor communicator (for example, “Timber shipment questions” Guyana
Chronicle letter to the Editor, December 25, 2006) and is not a
reliable source.
The Commissioner of the GFC issued an open letter almost a year ago, in
January 2007, unreservedly praising Barama just a week before Barama’s
certificate of good forest management was suspended by the auditor SGS
Qualifor. The Commissioner of the GFC continued to publicly defend
Barama as late as July 2007 (“Barama harvesting legally outside its
concession - Commissioner of Forests” Stabroek News, July 8, 2007),
less than 3 months before public announcement of major widespread
illegalities in the large-scale forestry concessions (‘False
declarations by logging companies under scrutiny’ Guyana Chronicle,
September 26, 2007). The GFC has not rescinded its approbation of
Barama even though on Presidential direction Barama has since been
levied with a nominal fine of US$ 470,000 for a variety of forest
crimes.
Meanwhile Barama is allowed to operate even though its own website
admits that the (legally prerequisite) forest management plan is still
“work in progress”; more than 16 years after it received its Timber
Sales Agreement. This illegally favourable treatment of Barama
contrasts with the Presidential claim reported on January 07 that “We
have a very strict system to effectively monitor what happens” (in
relation to stewardship of the forests).
Guyana ought to be able to draw on the new United Nations Climate
Change Adaptation Fund which had been agreed under the Marrakesh
Accords in 2001. The Bali conference finally agreed that the Global
Environmental Facility at the World Bank would act as the interim
secretariat for this Fund, and Guyana ought to be actively engaged to
make this Fund operationally effective.
In its brief analysis of the Bali meeting, the Earth Negotiations
Bulletin (ENB, volume 12 number 354, December 18, 2007) quotes the
Bhagavad Gita “You should not be impelled to act for selfish reasons,
nor should you be attached to inaction”. It should be a matter of
concern that Guyana is liable to serious damage from rising sea levels
caused by climate change but appears to have played no organisational
role at Bali. In contrast, the ENB records committee work by Bahamas,
Barbados, Belize, Grenada and St. Lucia. Guyana must take a more active
role if it wants to be taken seriously.
JANETTE BULKAN
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