What impacts can we expect on land use in developing countries?



4 What can we expect as the CDM evolves?
4 What can we expect as the CDM evolves?

What impacts can we expect on land-use in developing countries?

The impacts that the CDM will have on land use will largely depend on details yet to be decided and adopted by the CDM Executive Board - on project eligibility, the conditions required to ensure the permanence of project benefits, and procedures to set baselines. Purchasers of carbon currently favour projects in the energy and industrial sectors, partly as a result of the continued uncertainty on eligibility, but also due to the perceived risks associated with land use projects.

In the land-use sector, an emphasis on forestry projects - as opposed to agricultural activities - will continue, primarily because of: the relatively high rate of carbon uptake and ease of measurement of carbon in trees relative to soils; the short (5-year) commitment periods for emission reductions; and the readier availability of forestry criteria and standards that are accepted at global level as well as locally.

Unless there is some active intervention on the part of developing country governments and agencies wishing to promote people-oriented forestry, an emphasis on simple forest types, notably single-species plantations, in unpopulated areas with few 'people' issues may emerge. This is simpler to organise than smaller-scale, livelihood-oriented, complex forestry (which, despite its local benefits, tends not to be recognised by current forestry standards).

An emphasis on large-scale forestry schemes may also emerge, on land with good growth rates, using technologies to improve those rates. The financial profit margins on almost all land use activities are slight - and so the trend is for bigger operations that gain benefits from economies of scale.. The transaction costs involved in a CDM project are also significant: there are considerable information, negotiation, design, monitoring and risk management requirements. Only big operations will be able to meet such requirements, unless there is some intervention to aggregate or share costs between many smaller projects.

Such large-scale, simple forestry projects that avoid (or evade) 'people' issues can be very effective at delivering carbon storage. But they run the risk of running counter to other sustainable development initiatives that seek multiple goods and services from forests, and that seek to return power and beneficial rights to poor and forest-dependent people. Hence the need to ensure that CDM projects are informed by, and supportive of, locally-accepted sustainable development initiatives.

What impacts can we expect on livelihoods, especially for the poor?

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