President Bharrat Jagdeo in addressing the Paramaribo Dialogue on financing for sustainable forest management yesterday argued that proper valuation of forests is needed so that countries like Guyana are not “shortchanged” in negotiations.
Jagdeo also said that emphasis needs to be placed on avoided deforestation since the current approach to establish a framework for reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) will not help countries like Guyana and Suriname which have high forest cover and very low deforestation rates.
President Jagdeo, along with a team of high-level government officials, attended ‘The Paramaribo Dialogue’ which was opened by Suriname President Runaldo Venetiaan in Paramaribo and will run from Monday to Friday, the Government Information Agency (GINA) reported.
The forum is a country-led initiative on financing for sustainable forest management in support of the United Nations Forum on Forests and is organized by the Governments of the Republic of Suriname, among others.
President Jagdeo, GINA said, underlined the importance of financing for sustainable forest management while emphasizing the need to look beyond traditional approaches to financing for forests.
He made reference to the work of the Inter-Govern-mental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Mc. Kinsey and Company, and the Stern Review who have all underlined the importance of addressing deforestation as part of global climate change mitigation and pointed out that forests need to be included in any international framework being established to address climate change.
Moreover, Jagdeo noted that the current EU carbon trading scheme does not recognize standing forests nor does the Kyoto Protocol, which actually provides a disincentive for tropical forest conservation and protection.
He also made the point, GINA reported, that while Overseas Development Assistance for forest management has been helpful, there is need for a more predictable flow of finances which can only come from a market-based approach.
And in that light, he urged that much work must be done over the next year to influence decisions at the UNFCCC Conference of Parties (CoP) 14th Meeting in Poznan, Poland in December 2008 and other key climate negotiations so that by CoP 15 in Copen-hagen Denmark, 2009, there can be a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol that includes forests and one which takes into account Aforestation, Reforestation, and Avoided Deforestation. This successor agreement must also allow for a market-based mechanism that provides adequate compensation for sustainable forest management and conservation, Jagdeo added.
The Guyana President also referred to the complexity of trying to establish values for ecosystem services while emphasizing the need to look at the issue of opportunity costs since the majority of forest countries are poor countries that need to make economically viable decisions on their forests resources.
Accompanying Jagdeo at the meeting were Minister of Tourism, Industry & Com-merce Manniram Prashad, Advisers to the President, Shyam Nokta and Odinga Lumumba, Head of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce, Gerry Gouveia, and Commissioner of Forests James Singh.
