 Forests are essential to slow climate change. Trees absorb CO2 and store carbon. Apes disperse seeds that grow into trees. |
How saving the apes can help the fight against climate change.
Carbon trading has suddenly become a multi-BILLION dollar business. Not only could it reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow global warming, however, it could also help protect forests where gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans and gibbons live.
This new working group has been set up to explore the potential of carbon finance to contribute to the conservation of apes and their habitat. Some conservation groups are already putting these ideas into practice – see http://www.climate-standards.org/
The ApAl Carbon WG is currently lobbying to change the rules governing carbon trading so that “avoided deforestation” carbon credits (especially from tropical countries) are recognised under the Kyoto Protocol and the EU Emissions Trading System. We must convince world leaders BEFORE the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (see http://unfccc.int/2860.php ) concludes negotiations on the agreement that will follow the Kyoto Protocol (which ends in 2012).
The following documents explain this complex topic in more detail. Please read them and write to your MP, MEP, Senator or Congressman urging him or her to lend support.
Documents to download:
- Sample letter:
An open letter from the Ape Alliance chairman to Rt Hon David Miliband MP, UK Secretary of State for Environment
Please feel free to use this letter as a basis for yours, or simply write in support of it.
- Summary of arguments sent with above letter.
- Submission by SFM to the UK Environmental Audit Committee’s Voluntary Carbon Market Inquiry.
- Submission by SFM to DEFRA consultation on voluntary standards for carbon trading
- Two page leaflet summarising the issue.
- Forest Carbon briefing document by Global Canopy Programme (more info at www.globalcanopy.org)
- The VivoCarbon Initiative - Forests First in the Fight Against Climate Change (more info at www.globalcanopy.org)
- Ape Alliance members helped to draft the Forest NOW Declaration, launched with a full page ad in the Financial Times on 12th September 2007. Sign up to this important Declaration at www.ForestsNOW.org and view the calendar counting down to Copenhagen 2009 at www.forestsnow.org/calendar.php
Click here to view Ape Alliance videos.
Archive of scientific articles: Click here to download and read Carbon Working Group related articles.
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Science news & articles relating to the Carbon Working Group.
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Consumption habits cause rich countries to outsource emissions
Over a third of the carbon emissions related to the consumption of goods in wealthy nations actually occur in developing countries, according to a new analysis by researchers with the Carnegie Institution. Annually, each person if the United States outsources 2.5 tons of carbon due to consumption habits, most frequently in China. In Europe the figure of 'outsourced' emissions rises to 4 tons per person.
"Instead of looking at carbon dioxide emissions only in terms of what is released inside our borders, we also looked at the amount of carbon dioxide released during the production of the things that we consume," co-author Ken Caldeira said in a press release. Caldeira is a researcher in the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology.
http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0308-hance_outsource.html 08/03/2010 Click here to read on... |  |
U.S. and Brazil sign deforestation agreement
Brazil and the United States have signed an agreement to worth together to reduce deforestation as part of an effort to slow climate change.
The memorandum of understanding signed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Brasilia last Wednesday comes as talks on REDD, a proposed climate change mitigation mechanism that would pay tropical countries for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation, move forward despite the lack of a formal climate treaty.
http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0307-brazil_us_mou.html 07/03/2010 Click here to read on... |  |
Forestry satellite by 2013: Jairam Ramesh
Union Minister for Environment and Forest Jairam Ramesh has announced that the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch a dedicated forestry satellite in all likelihood in the year 2013.
Against the biennial exercise in vogue, the facility will help to continuously monitor the forest cover, health and diversity. Similarly, efforts are on to launch an indigenous satellite for monitoring greenhouse gases and aerosol emissions next year, which will place India on a rung occupied by a select few in the world.
http://beta.thehindu.com/sci-tech/energy-and-environment/article202431.ece?homepage=true 07/03/2010 Click here to read on... |  |
Australia pledges $30m to reduce deforestation in Sumatra
Australia has joined forces with its neighbor, Indonesia, to aid beleaguered forests in the Jambi province on the island of Sumatra, reports Reuters.
The A$30 million ($27 m) project aims to address the underlying drives of deforestation in Jambi, a province that has lost more than two-thirds of its forest as a result of logging, conversion for oil palm and pulp plantations, and subsistence agriculture. The initiative would fight deforestation, rehabilitate and reforest degraded land, and provide alternative incomes to locals, thereby raising the province's capacity to store carbon in its rainforests and peatlands.
http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0303-australia_jambi.html 03/03/2010 Click here to read on... |  |
Green fuels cause more harm than fossil fuels, according to report
by Ben Webster, Environment Editor
Using fossil fuel in vehicles is better for the environment than so-called green fuels made from crops, according to a government study seen by The Times.
The findings show that the Department for Transport's target for raising the level of biofuel in all fuel sold in Britain will result in millions of acres of forest being logged or burnt down and converted to plantations. The study, likely to force a review of the target, concludes that some of the most commonly-used biofuel crops fail to meet the minimum sustainability standard set by the European Commission.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7044708.ece 01/03/2010 Click here to read on... |  |
Whaling worsens carbon release, scientists warn
A century of whaling may have released more than 100 million tonnes - or a large forest's worth - of carbon into the atmosphere, scientists say.
Whales store carbon within their huge bodies and when they are killed, much of this carbon can be released.
US scientists revealed their estimate of carbon released by whaling at the Ocean Sciences meeting in Portland, US.
Dr Andrew Pershing from the University of Maine described whales as the "forests of the ocean".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8538033.stm 26/02/2010 Click here to read on... |
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The following organisations attended the first meeting of the Ape Alliance Carbon WG:
- Born Free Foundation
- Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation UK
- Cockroach Productions
- Fauna and Flora International
- International Fund for Animal Welfare
- Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden
- Sumatran Orangutan Society
- Sustainable Forestry Management
- Wildlife Conservation Society
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