Pacific Press Release – Secretariat of the Pacific Community

Climate change, deforestation and forest degradation highlights of Fiji scoping workshop

Wednesday, 26 August 2009, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) – Deforestation and forest degradation are identified as the primary source of carbon emissions in developing countries.

According to the communiqué of the August 2009 Forum Leader’s meeting in Cairns: ‘Just as deforestation is part of the problem, so reducing deforestation and providing incentives to preserve forests should be part of the solution. To defeat deforestation and forest degradation, we acknowledge that finance, technology and capacity development are necessary to underpin a step-wise process necessary to increase emissions reductions and carbon sequestration. Global carbon markets will play an important role, requiring robust methodological standards for measurable, reportable and verifiable actions.’

The reduction of carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and related technologies and financing instruments, will be the focus of discussions in a scoping workshop that will feature forest resource owners, the private sector, and various agencies from the forestry, agriculture and environment sectors. The Fiji REDD (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation) policy and scoping workshop sets out to develop national strategic directions for REDD.

The workshop will be held in Suva, Fiji Islands, from tomorrow, Thursday 27 August to 1 September 2009. It is supported and organised by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) and GTZ (German Technical Cooperation), in close collaboration with Fiji’s Forestry Department and Department of Environment.

One of the key strategic dimensions of the REDD policy and scoping workshop will be to identify priorities for forest sector synergies combining climate change adaptation and mitigation. This is in recognition of the important role forests play in adaptation, functioning to strengthen the resilience of local communities and ecosystems against impacts of climate change.

Another goal of the workshop is to identify resources and capacities needed in order to participate in international forest carbon trade. An appropriate national forest carbon inventory system for the measurement and monitoring of forest carbon stocks and rates of deforestation and forest degradation will be identified to enable comparable analysis and consistent measurement. Such systems or methodologies will be developed in compliance with the emerging United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) criteria for REDD and project scale inventory requirements.

Current international negotiations indicate that forest conservation, sustainable forest management (SFM) and forest enhancement are likely to be included in the REDD agreement, to be finalised at the climate summit in Copenhagen in December 2009. The draft text on methodology for REDD produced in Bonn in June 2009 makes particular reference to the need to involve local communities in measuring and monitoring carbon stocks. These statements are firmly supported by Fiji Islands and will be central considerations in the national policy framework on REDD.

For more information, contact Ms Christine Fung, workshop coordinator: christinef@spc.int.