Gov't stepping up drive for standing forests credits-plan being finalized with Chatham group.

Gov't stepping up drive for standing forests credits
-plan being finalized with Chatham grou
By Johann Earle
Stabroek News,
Monday, September 17th 2007.
http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article?id=56528977.

The Government of Guyana has a Memorandum of Understanding with the
Chatham Environmental Group and an operations plan is being finalised
which could see an innovative project to bring benefits from carbon
credits to an area of standing forest in Guyana, according to Minister
of Agriculture Robert Persaud.

At present forest protection does not qualify for tradeable carbon
offsets under the Kyoto Protocol.

But environment ministers from around the world will meet in Bali,
Indonesia in December to try to lay the groundwork for a successor
agreement to the U.N.-sponsored Kyoto pact, whose present commitments
expire in 2012.

Further, Persaud confirmed that Guyana will be participating at the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
Conference of Parties (COP) 13 in Bali, Indonesia in December 2007. "In
preparation for this, a series of meetings are being held regionally to
prepare for Bali and for which the issue of standing forests and Kyoto
Protocol are being discussed to arrive at regional positions on these
issues," Persaud said.

As expected, the Minister said, Guyana will be taking a firm position
on the need for the recognition of standing forests as an important
carbon sink and contributor to efforts to mitigate climate change and
the need for adequate compensation to be made to protection and
maintenance of standing forests through carbon credits and other offset
mechanisms. "We expect other countries in Latin America and the
Caribbean to adopt similar positions, as well as third world developing
countries that still have areas of primary standing forests," the
Minister said.

He said too that these issues are expected to feature in the upcoming
High Level Forum on September 24, 2007 convened by UN Secretary General
Ban Ki-moon for Heads of Government to discuss the issue of Climate
Change. He said that Presi-dent Jagdeo along with the Chairman of the
National Climate Committee Shyam Nokta and Presidential Advisor on
Sustainable Deve-lopment, Navin Chandarpal will be participating in
this forum.

Director General of the Iwokrama International Rain-forest Inc Dr David
Singh said that standing forests represent storage which should be
rewarded. He said that Iwokrama is still in negotiation to establish a
carbon facility which would be in tune with Government's policy on
carbon credits.

Dr Singh said that it is important for Guyana to state its position on
the issue prior to the outcome of the Bali meeting.

According to a recent Reuters article, the use of carbon offsetting as
a way to fund tropical forest protection drew backing from a range of
environmental and research groups last week.

The article said that demand for carbon offsets is growing from large
Western businesses. "Companies want to be seen to be green by paying
others to cut emissions of greenhouse gases on their behalf. Mobilising
such private sector finance to protect forests is gathering support.
Deforestation accounts for about one fifth of global greenhouse gas
emissions, while rising populations and demand for bio fuels and timber
are piling pressure on remaining trees," the article stated.

It said that environmental organisations grouped under the Global
Canopy Pro-gramme (GCP), and including Friends of the Earth Brazil and
Care International, on Wednesday called for such funding under a
successor to the Kyoto Protocol after 2013.

"(We want) the protection of standing forests included in all national
and international carbon markets," they said. "Halting deforestation is
an opportunity to score a big win against climate change," the report
quoted Andrew Mitchell, founder and director of the GCP, as saying.

The World Bank has announced it plans to pilot projects in Papua New
Guinea, Costa Rica, Indonesia and elsewhere, allowing countries to earn
offsets in return for not chopping down their forests, the article
said.