Showing posts with label deforestation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label deforestation. Show all posts

Governments are Acting to Curb the Fires in the Amazon

Governments are responding to the planetary threat posed by the fires in the Amazon. There has been a 79 percent increase in fires in 2019 compared to the same period last year. These fires are a threat to air, water, and wildlife. The Amazon generates one fifth of the world's oxygen and it is the single largest reservoir of fresh water and biodiversity on Earth. The Amazon also regulates climate including heat and precipitation. The ongoing degradation of this region could trigger tipping points from which we will not be able to recover.


Protest


Brazilian protestors are pleading for the world's help to combat the record setting fires in the Amazon. Brazil is home to 60 percent of the the Amazon (the other 40 percent is in Peru, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana).

At the end of August more than 30 protests were held across Brazil demanding action to combat the fires. People held signs that read, "SOS Amazon. Everybody for the Amazon." and "The Amazon belongs to the people". They chanted "Hello, planet! Wake up! Without the Amazon, you can't breathe!"

They are also calling out their federal government with much of their anger being directed at Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. Protestors in Rio chanted, "The Amazon stays, out with Bolsonaro". The far right Brazilian leader has been criticized  for the significant uptick in Amazonian deforestation.

Blame Bolsonaro


Opposition politicians, student activists, and Indigenous organizations have called for a congressional investigation into the cause of the fires. Bolsonaro has claimed the fires were set by environmentalists, however, the far more likely cause is slash and burn agriculture to make room for crops like soybeans and cattle ranching. Bolosnaro has emboldened those who are seeking to develop the Amazon.

Bolsonaro's contempt for environmental concerns in the Amazon is abundantly obvious. He has made good on his promise to clear the way for more development. This includes changing environmental rules, defunding government oversight, failing to enforce existing laws and dissolving the Amazon fund's committees. Perhaps the best example of Bolsonaro's disdain for ecological interests involves his appointees.

The populist leader has surrounded himself with climate deniers and conspiracy theorists. His environment minister was convicted of illegally approving a mining project in a conservation area and his foreign minister has described climate change as a "Marxist plot".

Bolsanoro's corruption and deceit have earned him the nickname of "Trump of the Tropics". Trump has tweeted praise for Bolsonaro, saying he is doing a "great job" and "He and his country have the full and complete support of the USA!" Bolsonaro said the tweet pleased him "a lot" and he expressed his "profound appreciation".

G-7 Pledges Assistance


While Trump avoided the climate summit at the recent G-7 meeting in France, other world leaders including the leader of the host nation, prioritized efforts to combat fires in the Amazon. The G-7 announced that they will assist countries in the region with their efforts to fight fire. They indicated their plans to discuss the future of the Amazon including reforestation at the United Nations General Assembly in September.

Led by French President Emmanuel Macron, world leaders at the G-7 summit came to an agreement on both technical assistance and financial aid. Macron announced that the G7 had agreed to an immediate fund of at least $20m (£16m) to help Amazon countries fight wildfires and launch a long-term global initiative to protect the rainforest. Macron made the announcement alongside Chile's President Sebastián Piñera. The proposed two-step process will involve collaborating with Amazonian countries to fight fires, protect biodiversity and reforestation. Similar support has also been proposed for African countries which have also been ravaged by wildfires.

Bolsonaro initially rejected the help that was offered by the G-7, but then he recanted due to public pressure. In a tweet, he said his country is being treated as though it "were a colony or no man's land." The Brazilian government said it will accept the financial assistance with the caveat that they administrate the disbursement.

European Aid and Trade


Brazil's new government may be responsible for the fires and deforestation in the Amazon but they will not be easily deterred. Changing the disastrous course of the Bolsonaro government will be difficult. So in addition to carrots, European leaders are also wielding sticks.

Germany and Norway have withdrawn their support for the Amazon fund (Norway has contributed $1.2 billion to the fund and Germany has donated 68 million). European leaders have also indicated that trade deals with Brazil are contingent on protecting the Amazon.

While protecting the Amazon may seem impossible, we have done it before. In 2004, a consorted global efforts succeeded in slowing deforestation in the region. However, to succeed today we will need a far more ambitious global effort.

The Earth's Lungs are Burning and Bolsanaro is to Blame

Wildfires have raged all around the world in 2019 but nowhere is the situation more serious than in the record breaking Amazon fires. There have been almost 80,000 fires in the Amazon this year, more than 30,000 in recent weeks and almost 10,000 since the middle of August. Brazil's National Institute for Space Research, or INPET reports that there have been 74,155 fires in the Amazon in 2019. The massive plumes of smoke from these fires stretch for 1.2 million square miles, cutting across the entire continent of South America and extending out into the South Atlantic Ocean. The Amazon is composed of 2.12 square miles of rainforest that spans Columbia and Peru as well as other countries. However, the majority of the Amazon is located in Brazil.

Bolsanaro is responsible


The far right Brazilian president Jair Bolsanaro is proving to be the leading cause of Amazonian rainforest destruction. In the eight months since Bolsanaro has been in power more than 1,330 square miles of forest have been lost. July saw the single biggest increase in deforestation ever in the Amazon.

"This devastation is directly related to President Bolsonaro’s anti-environmental rhetoric, which erroneously frames forest protections and human rights as impediments to Brazil’s economic growth," Christian Poirier, the program director of Amazon Watch, an environmental non-profit organization, said in a statement. "Farmers and ranchers understand the president’s message as a licence to commit arson with wanton impunity, in order to aggressively expand their operations into the rainforest."

Bosanaro's environmental ministry announced that foreign aid earmarked to fight deforestation would be funneled to cattle and soybean farmers. Like Trump Bolsanaro also makes profoundly ignorant statements like "poop every other day" to address deforestation.

Like Trump Bolsanaro is also at war with those who espouse reason and facts. In his bid to curtail the public's access to information, Bolsanaro fired the head of the INPE, Ricardo Magnus Osório Galvão.To add to the insanity that has earned Bolsanaro the nickname of Trump of the Tropics, the Brazilian president has made the absurd allegation that environmentalists set these fires. The truth is many of these fires are set by farmers who have been emboldened by Bolsanaro. Both Trump and the Brazilian president have earned reputations for their wanton environmental destruction.

Global catastrophe


Wildfires have raged on every continent on Earth in 2019 but there is something terrifyingly unique about the fires in the Amazon.  These fires are darkening the skies and choking Brazilian cities, but the impacts of these fires extend well beyond Brazil's borders. The fires in the Amazon are a threat to local communities, particularly the almost one million Indigenous people who inhabit the rainforests, but these fires are also a threat to life on Earth.

The Amazon is the planet's first line of defense against climate change and it is being razed to make room for carbon intensive farming. The Amazon is the largest rainforest in the world. Amazonian deforestation is responsible for 8 percent of net global emissions.

The Amazon rainforest is one of the Earth's biggest suppliers of oxygen deforestation would reduce the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere by 20 percent. The Amazon contains 25 percent of the carbon dioxide currently sequestered by the world's forests. It is also one of the richest areas of biodiversity on Earth.

For these reasons the Amazon fires have been referred to in ominous headlines. NBC news proclaimed, "Amazon wildfires could be 'game over' for climate change fight". The Economist called it a "forest apocalypse", Futurism referred to "Hell World" and Business Insider cited a "doomsday scenerio". The Washington Post reports the Amazonian rainforests are "under threat as never before".

Devastating feedback loops


There are a number of feedback loops that can trigger tipping points from which we may not be able to recover. One such feedback loop is the one between wildfires and climate change.  

In a climate change induced feedback loop record breaking heat record breaking wildfires go together. Fires are caused by warming temperatures which are caused by increasing atmospheric greenhouse gas levels. These fires in turn emit C02 which further exacerbates climate change.

According to a study published in Nature, warming temperatures could prevent trees from emitting oxygen and they could start emitting carbon instead.

The already devastating effects could get far worse. Approximately 20 percent or 300,000 square miles of Amazon rainforest in Brazil has been cut down. If we lose another 20 percent this could trigger an unstoppable feedback loop called "dieback" which could decimate the rainforest and turn the entire area into a savanna. This would exacerbate climate change by releasing 140 billion tons of stored carbon into the atmosphere. It would also mean an end to the world's most important carbon sink.

As reported in The Intercept, "losing another fifth of Brazil’s rainforest will trigger the feedback loop known as dieback, in which the forest begins to dry out and burn in a cascading system collapse… This would release a doomsday bomb of stored carbon, disappear the cloud vapor that consumes the sun’s radiation before it can be absorbed as heat, and shrivel the rivers in the basin and in the sky."

In a post for The Conversation, researchers said this process could also increase the number of fires. "Losing 20% of Brazil's rainforest could result in such a feedback loop, which would dry trees, leaving them unable to absorb as much carbon and much more flammable and likely to spread fires."

Brazilian environmental scientist Carlos Nobre is quoted by the Washington Post as saying: "The more the forest becomes degraded, the more the forest will become vulnerable to forest fires."

Poirier, summarized the situation when he said:  "The unprecedented fires ravaging the Amazon are an international tragedy and a dangerous contribution to climate chaos."

Victory for Responsible Palm Oil Plantations

A multi-year campaign from organizations like Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, and the Forest Trust has managed to arrest deforestation and human rights abuses from palm oil plantations. One of the last big company holdouts has finally agreed to purchase palm only exclusively from responsible sources. The Singapore based company known as Musim Mas made the announcement last week. This is significant because Musim Mas it is responsible for 18 percent of the world's palm oil.

In a press release Musim Mas announced its new sustainability policy, which, it said, “re-affirms its commitment to bring benefits to the community, respect the rights of smallholders to develop or conserve their land, while maintaining a strict guideline of No Deforestation, No Peatland Development and No Exploitation.”

Musim Mas joins Wilmar International who agreed to stop land clearing and human rights abuses last year. No a total of 96 percent of palm oil production is covered by a no-deforestation policy.

This policy will protect vital orangutan habitat and prevent slash and burn agricultural practices that release massive amounts of carbon into the atmosphere.

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Efforts in Support of Sustainable Palm Oil

Responsible sourcing of palm oil is a growing concern with consumers and by extension a growing number of corporations. Palm oil plantations are infamous for destroying both forests and peatlands. At the start of 2014 a survey of the state of responsible sourcing of palm oil showed just how bad things are. The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) analysis revealed that twenty-four of the 30 leading companies they surveyed do not source palm oil responsibly.

In a report titled Donuts, Deodorant and Deforestation: Scoring America’s Top Brands on their Palm Oil Commitments, USC looked at the 10 biggest companies in the packaged food, fast food and personal care industries and found that the vast majority have inadequate commitments or lack commitments altogether.

As reviewed in a Mongabay article, another more recent initiative ranks the world's 25 largest publicly listed palm oil companies in terms of transparency around the environmental performance of their operations. The project, called Sustainable Palm Oil Transparency Toolkit or SPOTT, was developed by The Zoological Society of London (ZSL).

The initiative assessed almost 50 sustainability indicators in seven categories, including: 1. Compliance with the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO)
2. Greenhouse gas emissions policy
3. Protection of forests
4. Supply chain traceability

To help pressure companies to compete and to provide a publicly accessible monitoring tool, ZSL has created a map that gives users a detailed picture of deforestation, fire hotspots and surviving forests.

SPOTT gives publicly listed companies a percentage score for each indicator and then these scores are combined to create an aggregate score which assesses their overall performance. This is an ideal tool for stakeholders who can monitor the activities of oil palm growers using the Google mapping tool with data layers for company concession site boundaries, protected areas, forest cover and loss, and NASA active fire alerts from the World Resources Institute’s Global Forest Watch.

SPOTT not only identifies laggards it also celebrates leaders. The outright SPOTT leader is New Britain Palm Oil Limited, a firm with operations in Papua New Guinea that was among the first to join the Palm Oil Innovation Group (POIG), an initiative that is pushing for stronger social and environmental standards for palm oil.

Another is Golden Agri-Resources which is the first palm oil company in Asia to establish a zero deforestation commitment. This company is tied with Malaysia's United Plantations for the second.

The worst on the list are five Malaysian firms including Sarawak Oil Palms Berhad and TSH Resources Berhad.

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Campaign Succeeds in Pressuring P&G into Sourcing Sustainable Palm Oil

Procter and Gamble (P&G) has responded to public pressure and agreed to stop thier environmentally destructive palm oil sourcing practices. This is yet another story about how the dangers of irresponsible and unsustainable practices make a company vulnerable to public shaming campaigns that can prove very harmful to a firm's reputation. A total of 400,000 people emailed P&G to express their outrage at the company's harmful activities.

On April 8th, the Washington Post reported that P&G has agreed to purchase 100 percent of their palm oil products from sustainable sources by 2015 and 100 percent of their paper products from recycled or third-party certified sources by 2020. A P&G spokesman explained that the company is now committed to a new "No Deforestation policy" and it intends to provide full traceability for all the palm oil and derivatives it uses by the end of next year.

“P&G has also signed the Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) commitment to help ensure zero net deforestation by 2020,” the spokesman said.

This is a powerful victory that vindicates the efforts of individuals and organizations that are working to protect the forest habitats of orangutans, Sumatran tigers and other species in Indonesia. These efforts also work to preserve the livelihoods of people in local communities alongside protecting regional biodiversity.

While P&G has a sustainability strategy, a year long Greenpeace investigation revealed that some of P&G's suppliers, (Bumitama, BW Plantation, KLK and Musim Mas), were linked to environmentally destructive practices associated with unsustainable palm oil plantations.

Their investigation revealed that P&G bough almost half a million tons of palm oil in 2013 and less than 10 percent was sustainably sourced. Palm oil is a very common ingredient in many household consumer products ranging from shampoo to food. Greenpeace claims that palm oil production is the single biggest driver of deforestation in Indonesia.

A global Greenpeace campaign began exposing the contradictions in P&G's practices and advertising. The success of their campaign reiterates the fact that when you make marketing claims you had better make sure that you are not exposing yourself to allegations of hypocrisy.

P&G recently launched an emotional ad campaign that leveraged motherhood, however, Greenpeace exposed the ways in which Orangutans, tigers and other species where being decimated by the company's sourcing of unsustainable palm oil. Greenpeace investigations further revealed orangutan graveyards near the plantations, suggesting that these animals may have been slaughtered by workers.

To help drive the point home Greenpeace activists scaled P&G's Cincinnati offices and unfurled a huge banner. While the nine activists were subsequently arrested and charged with burglary and vandalism, the event generated a lot of unwanted publicity for P&G.

P&G has promised to go beyond Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) criteria, including no deforestation policies and no conversion of peatland as well as respecting the rights of local communities and protection of high value conservation areas.

While the agreement from P&G is a very positive step in the right direction, it does not cover wood pulp and it still leaves suppliers six more years to clear forests. Even certified sustainable palm oil is often criticized for not going far enough to protect habitats. While much work still remains, P&G now joins Unilever, Ferrero, L’Oreal, Delhaize, Kellogg, Colgate-Palmolive, Wilmar, GAR, Nesle, General Mills and Mars in their commitments to reduce deforestation in their supply chains.

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Video - The Slaughter of Orangutans for Palm Oil



This video chronicles the heartrending story of Orangutans who are being wiped out so that Procter & Gamble (P&G) can expand palm plantations in Indonesia. We cannot claim to be civilized let alone sustainable when we decimate the habitats of other species. It is unconscionable that we destroy the homes of orangutans, elephants and tigers among other species, just to grow palm trees used in shampoos and other household products. Even worse is the fact that orangutans are being murdered by workers in palm oil plantations.

Irresponsible suppliers of palm oil must be eradicated from supply chains altogether in favor of reputable suppliers who have taken demonstrated steps toward sustainable harvest. Thankfully, there are sustainable palm oil plantation solutions.

A growing number of consumers and businesses are looking to ensure that the palm oil they use is sourced from sustainable palm oil plantations. Here is a short list of big corporations which have already taken steps to source sustainable palm oil: L’Oreal, Nestle, Unilever, General Mills, Colgate-Palmolive and Mars.

For a more complete summary see the Union of Concern Scientists' palm oil scorecard of consumer brands.

To help save the orangutans and other wildlife share this video as widely as possible. Find out more about how you can help save Orangutans and sign the petitions below:

Orang Utan Republik Foundation
Rainforest Trust
SOS Sumatra Orangutan Society
The Petition - Man Of The Forest
Save the Orangutans - The Petition Site
SAVE OUR ORANGUTANS FROM EXTINCTION - Petition
Petition to The Indonesian Government · Save the Orangutans and Stop the Indonesian Palm Oil Exploitation
Petition | STOP KILLING ORANGUTANS | Change.org
Petition | STOP THE GENOCIDE OF ORANGUTANS | Change.org
Petition | Save Orangutans! | Change.org
Petition | Save Borneo and its orangutans for God's Sake! | Change.org
Petition | Palm Oil Industry: STOP THE TORTURE AND KILLING OF ORANGUTAN
Greenpeace Petition to Save the Forests

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Palm Oil's Environmental Impacts: Solutions to Deforestation and Methane Emissions

The palm oil industry is a major cause of deforestation, and new research indicates that palm oil processing is also a significant source of methane emissions. Despite these very serious issues there are solutions to both problems. Palm oil is a widely used edible vegetable oil derived from the mesocarp of the fruit of the oil palms.

The palm oil industry has earned a bad reputation for its destruction of forests and peatlands. Both of which contribute to climate change as the loss of forests and peatlands adversely impact biodiversity, generates carbon emissions and reduces global carbon sinks. Over the last few years years sustainability certification in the palm oil industry has been addressing some of these deforestation concerns.

Unilever was criticized because the companies they used to source palm oil were clearing rainforests and carbon-dense peatlands. After some pressure, Unilever addressed the problem by flexing its supply chain muscles and dropping Sinar Mas Agro Resources and SMART. In 2010, Unilever doubled the amount of the palm oil it draws from sustainable sources. According to Unilver's most recent sustainability report, the company now gets all of its palm oil from sustainable sources.

In 2011, the World Bank suspended lending to all oil palm plantation projects, after the Wilmar Group, was found to be environmentally irresponsible. Cadbury New Zealand stopped using palm oil altogether after consumer complaints. This kind of public pressure not only arrested the clear cutting of forests in these areas, it has strengthened the market for sustainable palm.

In response to pressure from Greenpeace and other organizations, Wilmar International, the world's largest palm oil trader recently announced a No Deforestation Policy. The policy has the potential to be a landmark win for the world's forests and the people that depend on them for their livelihoods.

Efforts to reign-in the palm oil industry have met with considerable resistance. A group known as Consumer Alliance for Global Prosperity (CAGP), (a front-group formed in August of 2010), are behind a campaign they call "Pulp Wars." They attack environmental groups and corporations that have agreed to stop sourcing unsustainable palm oil from Indonesia.

The latest adverse environmental impact associated with the palm oil industry is methane. This is a potent greenhouse gas (GHG) that by some estimates is as much as 72 times as destructive as carbon dioxide. According to research published in the Journal of Nature Climate Change, waste water produced during the processing of Palm oil releases massive quantities of methane. The study indicates that the methane produced by a single palm oil waste water lagoon during a year is roughly equivalent to the emissions from 22,000 passenger vehicles. The analysis conducted by researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder suggest that methane emissions from palm oil waste water equal 30 percent of all fossil fuel emissions from Indonesia.

Due to its environmental impacts the palm oil industry is currently being subjected to a great deal of scrutiny. In response many companies in the sector are seeking sustainability certification. However, this certification does not address waste water emissions.

The researchers suggest that the methane should be captured and used as a source of renewable energy. The amount of methane biogas that went uncollected from palm oil waste water lagoons last year alone could have met a quarter of Malaysia’s electricity needs.

Using palms to make energy is nothing new. Microbiologist Willie Smits is the founder of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation, which not only works to help orphaned or imperiled apes, but also helps locals learn sustainable farming methods and the benefits of reforestation. Smits also takes part in the Masarang Foundation, an amazingly innovative social entrepreneurship enterprise that uses thermal energy to turn sugar palm juice into sugar and ethanol, providing jobs and power to the community while preserving the local forests.

Using palm oil emissions from lagoons is different in that it can generate energy by capturing methane that would otherwise contribute to climate change.

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Study Shows Deforestation of Tropical Rainforest Decreases Precipitation

Deforestation can have many impacts including increases in un-sequestered carbon, and decreases in atmospheric oxygen, but according to new research loss of tropical rainforests can also significantly decrease rainfall. According to a new study titled, "Observations of increased tropical rainfall preceded by air passage over forests," the destruction of tropical forests could reduce rain across the Amazon basin by more than a fifth (21%) in the dry season by 2050.

This is the finding of researchers from the University of Leeds and the NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology. Their study suggests that rainforests can double the amount of rainfall even in areas thousands of kilometres away.

Lead author Dr Dominick Spracklen from the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds said: “Our study implies that deforestation of the Amazon and Congo forests could have catastrophic consequences for the people living thousands of kilometres away in surrounding countries."

According to their data the more vegetation the air had traveled over, the more moisture it carried and more rain was produced.

© 2012, Richard Matthews. All rights reserved.

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Study Shows that Climate Change is Killing Forests

Climate change is causing a massive forest die-off on almost every continent on Earth. Forests are already under threat from illegal logging and land clearing for agriculture. According to a new paper published in the journal Nature Climate Change, trees in forests all around the world are dying due to dry climatic conditions and elevated heat. This study corroborates the notion that global warming is increasing the risk of fires, disease and pest infestations like pine beetles. This die-off is undermining the wide range of ecological and economic benefits that forests provide.

The study, authored by William Anderegg of Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University and Jeffrey Kane and Leander Anderegg of Northern Arizona University, reviews dozens of scientific papers dealing with the ecological impacts of climate change on forests.

Although forests reflect more light and decrease local temperatures, there are a host of other issues that are exacerbated by global warming. Forests reduce the impacts of climate change by sequestering carbon and releasing oxygen, however, less trees means more carbon and less oxygen. This constitutes a dangerous feedback loop. Declining forests are being impacted by global warming and this is interfering with the natural processes that mitigate climate change.

As reviewed in a Mongabay article, "Forests cover 42 million square kilometers or 30 percent of Earth's land surface...Forests store 45 percent of the carbon found in terrestrial ecosystems and sequester as much as 25 percent of annual carbon emissions from human activities, helping mitigate a key driver of climate change...clear-cutting of forests in the tropics accounts for 8-15 percent of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions."

As stated in Science Daily, "From an ecosystem perspective, forest die-off will also likely affect hydrological processes and nutrient cycles...decomposition of fallen trees releases carbon into the atmosphere, thus producing a warming effect...Debris from fallen trees could also increase a forest's fire risk."

These impacts have a very real economic costs. Forests account for trillions of dollars of annual economic activity. Mass tree mortality will incur substantial losses to the timber industry and could cause declines in real-estate property values.

Forests cover 42 million square kilometers or 30 percent of Earth's land surface. Every continent on Earth is being impacted by forests loss with the exception of Antarctica. In the US, there has been an increase in the incidence and severity of forest fires since 2000. A wide range of forest are being impacted including the Redwood forest in Marin, CA. Rainforest in Borneo. Forests in Southeast Asia, the Russian Far East, and the Amazon has been particularly affected by drought over the past 20 years. Roughly a million hectares of Amazon rainforest suffered from severe drought stress in 2010.

Although more research is required, the study suggest a troubling global trend that could cost billions of dollars and substantially accelerate climate change.

© 2012, Richard Matthews. All rights reserved.

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The Business Case for REDD (Guide)

This complementary guide makes the Business Case for REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation). It reviews what REDD is and why you need to factor it into your sustainability strategy. The guide addresses how businesses and stakeholders can benefit from REDD's effect to the carbon market. It also reviews how to get involved in REDD investment and the regulations involved.

The guide is provide by The CarbonNeutral Company, voted the Best Offset Retailer in the Voluntary Carbon Market (‘Environmental Finance, Voluntary Carbon Market Survey,’ 2011 and 2012). For immediate advice on how supporting forestry projects will benefit your organization, please email us or call +44 (0)20 7833 6000 / 1-646-367-5800.

Click here to download this complementary guide.

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