The world’s lungs (part3)

REDDy, steady, grow
Economic development both causes deforestation and slows
it. In the early stages of development people destroy forests for
a meagre living. Globalisation is speeding up the process by
boosting the demand for agricultural goods produced in tropical
countries. At the same time, as people in emerging countries
become more prosperous, they start thinking about issues
beyond their family’s welfare; their governments begin to
pass and slowly enforce laws to conserve the environment.
Trade can also allow the greener concerns of rich-world consumers
to in uence developing-world producers.
The transition from clearing to protecting, however, is occurring
too slowly. The main international e ort to speed it up
is an idea known as REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation
and Forest Degradation), which pays people in developing
countries to leave trees standing. This is not an outlandish
concept. It is increasingly common for governments and companies
to pay for forest and other ecosystem services. To protect
its watershed, New York pays farmers in the Catskills not
to develop their land. REDD schemes aspire to do this on a
much larger scale. The only notable success of the Copenhagen
climate-change conference last year was a commitment to
pursue them. Half a dozen rich countries, including Norway,
America and Britain, have promised $4.5 billion for starters.
The di culties are immense. REDD projects will be e ective
only in places where the government sort-of works, and
the tropical countries with the most important forests include
some of the world’s worst-run places. Even in countries with
functioning states, some of the money is bound to be stolen.
Yet with su cient attention to monitoring, veri cation and,
crucially, making sure the cash goes to the people who can actually
protect the forest, REDDcould work. That will cost much
more than has so far been pledged. The most obvious source
of extra cash is the carbon market, or preferably a carbon tax.
Since saving forests is often the cheapest way to tackle carbon
emissions, funding it this way makes sense.
With global climate-change negotiations foundering, the
prospects of raising cash for REDD that way look poor. But the
money must be found from somewhere. Without a serious effort
to solve this problem, the risk from climate change will be
vastly increased and the planet will lose one of its most valuable,
and most beautiful, assets. That would be a tragedy.