Indonesia's Papua to Protect Forests, Seeks Cash

Adhityani Arga, PlanetArk 6 Dec 07;

NUSA DUA, Indonesia - Indonesia's Papua wants to preserve part of its rainforest in exchange for cash to help the world slow global warming, the governor said at UN climate talks.

"We have decided to set aside a large part of our conversion forests to save the planet," Governor Barnabas Suebu told Reuters during UN climate talks in Bali. Conversion forests are earmarked for clearance for palm oil or pulp plantations.

Deforestation accounts for about 20 percent of all man-made carbon emissions blamed for global warming -- trees soak up carbon when they grow and release it when they rot or burn.

Stopping or curbing the destruction is widely regarded as a crucial part of any new climate pact to succeed the UN's Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012.

Suebu said that the remote forest-rich province on the Indonesian half of Guinea island was offering to preserve 7 million hectares (17.30 million acres) -- an area almost the size of the Mediterranean island of Cyprus.

In return, Papua hopes to earn millions of dollars through carbon trading by getting credit for leaving the forests intact.

Delegatas at the UN climate talks on the resort island of Bali are aiming to launch talks to work out a new pact by 2009 to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, which runs to 2012.

The United Nations hopes the two-week conference will agree to study schemes to curb emissions by slowing deforestation and bind it into an emissions trading scheme.

Suebu said his scheme could help boost development in the area, where more than 80 percent of about 500,000 households live in poverty. But he said the world needs to create ways to ensure money goes to the forest-dependent people of Papua.

"The Papuan people own the forests. The money should go to them," he said.


HEADSTART

With 42 millon hectares of tropical forests and some of the richest biodiversity in the world, Papua is considered the country's last rainforest frontier. But it is under threat from increased cutting and clearing for palm oil plantations as well as rampant illegal logging.

Suebu vowed to get tough on illegal logging, by stepping up law enforcement and introducing a ban on log exports by January. The governor also plans to restrict logging licenses.

Papua took a headstart by signing agreements with several carbon investment companies, including Carbon Pool of Australia to help finance ways to preserve forests. But the central government in Jakarta is wary.

Forestry Minister Malam Sambet Kaban recently dubbed Papua's decision to go ahead with carbon trading outside the national framework as a move to "sell our forests at a discount."

The minister warned of "vultures" who lure governors into making decisions that would have long-term effort on Indonesia's plan to push for a fair and equitable pay-and-preserve plan under the new climate deal.

But Suebu brushed aside the criticism. "The central government is busy counting money. As Papuans say: we're busy fighting over the fish before it's even caught."

(Editing by Alister Doyle)