Department of Energy and Climate Change 

PRESS NOTICE Date: 14 October 2008 Ref: PN2008/1 Embargoed until 10:30am 14 October 2008   ELIASCH REVIEW ON INTERNATIONAL DEFORESTATION PUBLISHED Full details at http://www.occ.gov.uk/activities/eliasch.htm The international community should enable rainforest countries to halve deforestation by 2020 and make the global forest sector ‘carbon neutral' by 2030. This is the recommendation of an independent report to the Prime Minister published today.   The Eliasch Review, ‘Climate Change: Financing Global Forests', is an independent report commissioned by the Prime Minister and led by Johan Eliasch, Special Representative on Deforestation. It provides a comprehensive analysis of the financing and mechanisms needed to support sustainable management of forests and reduce emissions associated with deforestation.   

A new Friends of the Earth report "MALAYSIAN PALM OIL: GREEN GOLD OR GREEN WASH?" exposes the green-wash of the Malaysian palm oil lobby and shows that: 

1.    Malaysia's largest state, Sarawak, plans to more than double its 2007 levels of oil palm acreage by 2010, taking it to a total of 1.3 million hectares. This expansion is coming at the expense of tropical forests contrary to claims by the Malaysian palm oil lobby.

2.    Plantation companies regularly practice open burning on carbon rich peat soils releasing millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and contributing to regional air pollution.

3.    Forest reserves promised to the Penan indigenous communities of Sarawak - threatened by plantation expansion and logging - have never materialised.

The full text of the report is online here:
http://www.foei.org/en/publications/pdfs/malaysian-palm-oil

In recognition of the fact that orang-utans (Pongo spp.) are severely threatened, a meeting of orangutan experts and conservationists, representatives of national and regional governmental and non-governmental organizations, and other stakeholders, was converted in Jakarta, Indonesia, in January 2004. Prior to this meeting we surveyed all large areas for which orang-utan population status was unknown. Compilation of all survey data produced a comprehensive Picture of orang-utan distribution on both Borneo and Sumatra. These results indicate that in 2004 there were c. 6,500 P. abehii remaining on Sumatra and at least 54,000 P. pygniaeus on Borneo. Extrapolating to 2008 on the basis of forest loss on both islands Suggests the estimate for Borneo Could be 10% too high but that for Sumatra is probably still relatively accurate because forest loss in orang-utan habitat has been low during the conflict in Aceh, where most P. abehi Occur. When those population sizes are compared to known historical sizes it is clear that the Sumatran orang-utan is in rapid decline, and unless extraordinary efforts are made soon, it could become the first great ape species to go extinct. In contrast, Our results indicate there are more and larger populations of Bornean orang-utans than previously known. Although these revised estimates for Borneo are encouraging, forest loss and associated loss of orang-utans are occurring at an alarming rate, and Suggest that recent reductions of Bornean orang-utan populations have been far more severe than previously supposed. Nevertheless, although orang-utans on both islands are Under threat, we highlight some reasons for cautious optimism for their long-term conservation.

Oil palm is one of the world's most rapidly increasing crops. We assess its contribution to tropical deforestation and review its biodiversity value. Oil palm has replaced large areas of forest in Southeast Asia, but land-cover change statistics alone do not allow an assessment of where it has driven forest clearance and where it has simply followed it. Oil palm plantations support much fewer species than do forests and often also fewer than other tree crops. Further negative impacts include habitat fragmentation and pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions. With rising demand for vegetable oils and biofuels, and strong overlap between areas suitable for oil palm and those of most importance for biodiversity, substantial biodiversity losses will only be averted if future oil palm expansion is managed to avoid deforestation.

Elisabeth Benkam, Voices of Africa reporter in Yaounde, Cameroon

To fight poaching, the Cameroonian ministry of animal husbandry and fishing launched in 2002 a grasscutter breeding initiative in favour of the national Association of the breeders of the grasscutter (ANEAC).

By Gabriel Amoah.

Statistics available to The Statesman in Kumasi from the Wildlife Division of the Forestry Commission reveals that annual volume of bush meat estimated at 384,992 tons valued at 350 million dollars is harvested in Ghana as against the total annual consumption which also estimated at 225,287 tons and valued at 205 million dollars