Vital rule of forest in climate change

by Patali CHAMPIKA RANAWAKA

A special session on climate change was held in the United Nations Headquarters in New York in 2008. Representing Sri Lanka, I officiated at the meeting which was attended by many world leaders and leading environmentalists. At the inauguration ceremony, Mr. Bloomberg the Mayor of New York, welcoming all delegates to New York, "The Global Capital", said that he would plant one million trees in his city to combat Global Warming. When a colleague inquired as to why I looked so amused by the announcement of the Mayor, I said, no wonder Mr. Bloomberg looked at things with his USA centric world viewpoint and as a result would make such announcements as he fights shy of looking at global economic super-power China and its commercial capital Shanghai.

I had to tell my colleague if not for what China had lent the USA, economically there would have been a Chiamerica instead of the USA. It is a fact that considering the life span of a tree to be 20 years, a tree absorbs 12kg of carbon annually as carbon sequestration value.

Amusing us?

Annually a USA citizen emits 24,000 kg of carbon and in 2007 the population of New York alone was 20 million. Therefore, based on simple mathematics, one million trees Mr. Bloomberg was to plant would absorb 12 million kg of carbon which would eventually neutralise carbon emissions of only 500 people! Wasn't the mayor of the so-called Global Capital, amusing us?, I asked, my colleague.

At various fora where issues related to environment are discussed, very often I used to hear that 20% of global warming is caused due to deforestation and if it could be arrested, 1/5th of the problem is solved. Also, there is a school of thought, that carbon emitted by burning of fossil fuel could be neutralised by planting trees. It is interesting for us to ascertain the truth behind these utterances.

Naturally forests are carbon storages and they act as carbon sinks. Carbon sequestration which is a geoengineering technique for long term storage of carbon that could capture and store carbon from the atmosphere has been proposed as a mitigating measure for the accumulation of carbon in atmosphere which causes global warming and climate change.

It has been estimated that 20% of the carbon accumulation in atmosphere is caused due to deforestation (the figure may vary from 18%-23% as various calculations are based on distinct mathematical models). So, when we cut trees or slash and burn them they release carbon which is stored and the carbon absorption power of the eco-system may also be reduced. These twin effects create a vicious cycle which could help carbon to accumulate in our atmosphere.

It has been calculated that 54% of the deforestation is due to slash and burn technique of agriculture, 22% is due to palm oil cultivation, 19% is due to logging and 5% due to cattle ranching.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (UNFAO), Brazil leads the process clearing 7,667,649 ha per year in (2000-2005). Indonesia had come second clearing 4,623,322 ha per year, Sudan and Myanmar have come 3rd and 4th clearing 1,455,445 ha and 1,151,506 ha respectively. It is estimated that 48% of the world deforestation had come from Brazil, but the way the Indonesians had cleared their forests and burnt it, Indonesia is becoming the biggest carbon emitter due to deforestation. Nearly 13.7 million ha of forests are being cleared and that means for each second, one acre of forest is being cleared.

Landmass of Sri Lanka is 6.5 million and that means for each year, forest land twice the landmass of Sri Lanka vanishes due to deforestation. But some countries have taken aggressive steps to reforest their land and an estimated 6.4 million ha is being replanted globally, so that the net effect could be 7.3 million ha as far as landmass is concerned.

Twin impact

I mentioned the twin impacts of deforestation which are that contained carbon is being released and the ability to absorb carbon is being reduced. The leaves of trees are more sophisticated than the modern day solar panel. They absorb carbon (form of Co2) and water and the solar energy supplies necessary energy to produce starch and other chemicals releasing vital oxygen as byproducts. The process is called photo-synthesis and is very vital for humankind. Because we human beings absorb o2 (Oxygen) and our food reacts with the oxygen and produces energy we need and after this digesting process Co2 is released. So trees and human beings are complemented in exchanging vital o2 and Co2. Also trees produce our food, conserve our water resources, creates organic topsoil, and generate energy we need. So, without plants and trees human beings cannot exist.

Although, we had identified the rate of deforestation and its ill effects on global warming, human beings could not stop it due to various reasons. Why is deforestation taking place? There are many reasons. The first is that human beings need land for their settlements. New generations need land for their young families. The second thing is human beings need food and therefore they need land to cultivate and naturally virgin soil is searched for cultivation of crops. Not only food, oil palm, ethanol production, and cattle ranching ., need more and more lands. The deforestation process continues unabated because our value system and the market place could not be able to value it. The ecological services rendered by forests such as carbon sequestration, water conservation, water and air filtration, conserving vital biodiversity etc, are not being valued. Because trees are not there in the market place which only value those who supply and demand at the present moment.

Once I instructed our forest researchers to evaluate the ecological services rendered by the Sinharaja forest. They used 17 parameters and concluded that Sinharaja alone could generate 59 million US$ worth of ecological services annually. So, there are methods to evaluate (partly) the real value. But the present day market place and capital circuit only value the logging price of the forest. So, deforestation continues.

The other important reason is that there is no strong convention or global legal instrument to protect and value the forest. The UN and REDD+ program is now focusing on this but non implementation of the Kyoto Protocol and Rio Convention on climate change may hamper any attempt to seriously implementing these programs. Because you could not be able to absorb all the carbon by using forest and other plants.

Global forest cover

It is wrong to assume that the geological cycle of fossil fuel could not be fully absorbed by biological cycle of plants and trees. It is estimated that 84% of the global forest cover is owned by public institutions or governments.

In Sri Lanka it is almost 100%. We have 2,037,469 ha of forests (31% of the total landmass) where 1,027,544 ha (15.6%) is dry monsoon and 471,583 ha is sparse or other forest (7.19%). Forest plantations covered 96,250 ha and mangroves covered 9,530 ha of land. Mountain (3,099), sub-mountain (65,792), lowland rain (124,340), moist monsoon (221,977) forests cover the other areas.

We estimated our annual carbon sink capacity of our forest and found that our annual carbon sequestration by natural forest alone contributed 13 million tons of carbon. It is noteworthy that our total emission due to fossil fuel burning is 12 million tons in (2007) and we would proudly say that we are carbon negative.

Some countries are trying to achieve zero carbon emission status by 2020 or 2050 but our rich forest system already had achieved that target. Unfortunately we have not yet been rewarded for this natural absorption process. And we also should be mindful of the fact that if we were to introduce more coal plants and destroy our valuable forest cover we would lose our prestigious position as a carbon negative country.

In order to stop the encroachment and deforestation we surveyed, mapped out and clearly demarcated the forest and conservation areas of the whole island excluding the Northern Province.

Boundaries were placed firmly so that all the forest areas could be identified and sealed. So no one can now say that publicly owned forest cover is declining at a rate of 1.6% or more. It is quite an achievement for our Ministry and the Forest Department. Over 12,000 km of boundaries have already demarcated. Next year we will complete the Northern Province as well covering the whole island. We should be mindful that the total carbon stored globally in forest was more than the amount of carbon in the entire atmosphere.

So, releasing carbon to the atmosphere by way of deforestation would have been a devastating effect on humankind on this earth. Biologists had estimated that the earth had undergone five grate extinctions so far (late Ordovician, late Devonian, late Permian, late Triassic and late Cretacruos) and we are facing sixth grate mass extinction (Holocene). Rain forests and ecosystems are home to 90% of the known species of the earth. So, if we continue to destroy forests we would face the sixth grate extinction precipitated entirely by human beings and the humankind would be very much in the midst of its extinction.

The writer is the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources