Conserving key rainforests in Indonesia instead of clearing them for palm oil plantations could triple revenues, help combat climate change, secure water supplies, improve livelihoods, and provide the world’s remaining populations of critically endangered Sumatran orangutans with a much-needed lifeline. Such were the findings of a study carried out by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) under its Great Apes Survival Partnership (GRASP).
As part of the study, the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), in collaboration with PanEco and Yayasan Ekosistem Lestari (YEL), investigated orangutan habitats in the context of carbon emissions and the opportunity cost of converting forests for commercial use. The resulting report estimates that many of the coastal, peat-rich forests of Sumatra, which are home to dense populations of the last 6,600 surviving Sumatran orangutans, could be worth up US$22,000 a hectare at current carbon prices. In comparison, the same land can generate less than US$7,400 a hectare when converted to palm oil plantations.
Disappearing forests
In the last two decades, 380,000 hectares of forest in Sumatra have been lost to illegal logging each year, resulting in carbon value losses estimated at more than US$1 billion. While in the last decade, nearly 80 per cent of deforestation in Sumatra’s peatlands, which harbor some of the world’s carbon richest soil, has been driven by the expansion of oil palm plantations.
If deforestation continues at the current rate, it is estimated that the Sumatran orangutan may become the first of the great apes living today to become extinct in the wild. Indeed, the report warns that local populations in parts of Sumatra could disappear as early as 2015.
REDD+ benefits
The ICRAF report calls for more international support for REDD+ projects in key orangutan forests.
Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director, said: “Prioritizing investments in sustainable forestry including REDD+ projects can, as this report demonstrates, deliver multiple Green Economy benefits and not just in respect to climate, orangutan conservation and employment in natural resource management. The report indicates that in Aceh and in North Sumatra there has been a reported 50 per cent decline in water discharges in as many as 80 per cent of rivers as a result of deforestation-losses that have serious implications for agriculture and food security including rice production and human health.”
Deforestation is also a key cause of the increased flooding that has affected more than 500,000 people over the last decade. Unsustainable logging may also be linked to the more than 500 fires that have impacted the Tripa swamp forests in the Aceh province in the past ten years with economic losses estimated at more than $10 billion between 2000 and 2010.
Suspending conversions
Currently the Government of Norway is supporting the Government of Indonesia in its efforts to reduce deforestation and illegal logging under a $1 billion agreement that includes a two-year suspension of new concessions that convert peatlands and primary forests.
“This study underlines that investing and re-investing in forests and the services they provide can be far more profitable and with social and environmental outcomes than trading away our common future for short-term gains,” said Erik Solheim, Norwegian Minister of the Environment and International Development.
Read the full story here.
Photo credit: World Agroforestry