410 Forest-type / World-wide

–World-wide: 18) Economic Growth as Limiting Factor for Wildlife Conservation? 19) Old treaties didn’t thought old forests were carbon neutral, 20) RAN one of a shrinking group of NGOs that still support industrial logging of ancient primary old-growth, RAN’s rationalizations and responces, 22) issues related to taxation incentives for the establishment carbon sink forests, 23) REDD framework claims to aid in the destruction of indigenous cultures, 24) The David versus Goliath moment in Bali, 25) Forgotten in mechanisms devised to compensate for deforestation, 26) MicroRNAs, coordinate growth and aging processes in plants, 27) phosphorus or nitrogen increases carbon emission from soil. 28) Three way forest affect warfare, 29) Friends of the Earth gives up on FSC, 30) Birds of the world are in serious trouble, 31) New fires sensors are powered by being plugged into live trees, 32) Human effect on forest ecology is quite profound,

Articles:
World-wide:

18) “Economic Growth as Limiting Factor for Wildlife Conservation” by Brian Czech, ABSTRACT: The concept of limiting factor includes the lack of welfare factors and the presence of decimating factors. Originally applied to populations and species, the concept may also be applied to wildlife in the aggregate. Because the decimating factor of economic growth eliminates welfare factors for virtually all imperiled species via the principle of competitive exclusion, economic growth may be classified as the limiting factor for wildlife conservation. The wildlife profession has been virtually silent about this limiting factor, suggesting that the profession has been laboring in futility. The public, exhorted by neoclassical economists and political leaders, supports economic growth as a national goal. To address the limiting factor for wildlife conservation, wildlife professionals need to become versed in the history of economic growth theory, neoclassical economic growth theory, and the alternative growth paradigm provided by ecological economics. The Wildlife Society should lead the natural resources professions in developing a position on economic growth. From: Robin Silver rsilver@biologicaldiversity.org

19) Old forests – those that are more than 200 years old – are not protected by international treaties because they were thought to be carbon neutral. But a team from Belgium says such forests actually continue to take up carbon dioxide and are therefore important carbon sinks. Sebastiaan Luyssaert and colleagues at Antwerp University reckon that 15% of the world’s old forests, which are not usually considered when offsetting carbon dioxide emissions, provide at least 10% of the global terrestrial carbon sink. So disturbing these forests would release huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere and seriously contribute to climate change. Luyssaert and colleagues say old forests continue to store carbon over time periods of centuries, mainly in live woody tissues and decomposing leaf litter and soil. Although young forests admittedly store more carbon each year, they contain less biomass. As a result, the total amount of carbon captured from the atmosphere in these younger forests is lower. The researchers obtained their results by studying existing measurements of how much carbon is absorbed by and released from old forests in temperate and boreal regions around the world. These measurements included biomass studies combined with simple ecological modelling; productivity ratio (the amount of carbon added each year to forests compared to that released from the decomposition of dead plant matter); and air flow in and out of forests. The team concluded that forests between 15 and 800 years of age are not carbon neutral as previously believed but can sequester around 1.3 gigatonnes of carbon per year. They are therefore crucial long-term carbon sinks and disturbing them would release vast quantities of carbon into the atmosphere. Most larger old forest landscapes are located in Russia, Canada, Alaska and the US Pacific Northwest, with smaller ones found in northern Scandinavia. http://environmentalresearchweb.org/cws/article/research/36084

20) Rainforest Action Network (RAN) is one of a shrinking group of international environmental NGOs that supports industrial logging of ancient primary and old-growth forests by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Sadly, as RAN prepares to gather for their annual lavish, celebrity studded “Revel” fund-raiser, there is little to celebrate regarding their disjointed and harmful Old Growth Campaign — legitimate questions regarding their FSC support have been stonewalled, Ontario’s continued ancient forest destruction legitimized, and the forest protection movement needlessly divided. While RAN does good work with coal, biofuel and now oil sands campaigns; it continues to egregiously sell out ancient forests with unquestioning support for FSC certified industrial logging of ancient forests, and by repeatedly promoting and supporting deals that legitimate large scale industrial development of ancient forest wildlands. First they led the sell-out of British Columbia’s Great Bear temperate rainforests, and recently gave their stamp of approval to Ontario’s continued ancient forest liquidation for vague promises of possible protections in 15 years. RAN’s outdated forest protection campaign is a leading threat to the world’s life giving forest ecosystems and must be changed or stopped. Last week Friends of the Earth (FoE) became the first major international NGO to confirm they no longer support FSC certification; which falsely suggests primary and old-growth forest logging is desirable, benefits the climate, and is even sustainable; and that plantations are forests. FoE is to be commended for responding to recent science showing old-growth’s role in carbon removal is under-appreciated, acknowledging FSC’s activities in primary and plantation forest greenwashes business as usual destructive practices, and being capable of self-reflection and course adjustments. To the extent RAN still works on forest issues, they obstinately focus upon promoting protected areas in some remaining wildernesses, and making first-time industrial logging less damaging elsewhere, rather than uniting the movement to work for an end to ancient forest logging as the keystone response to the climate and biodiversity crises. RAN must stop supporting outdated, destructive logging. The following alert at the lnk below lets Revel’s many sponsors know they are funding greenwashing of ancient forest devastation — and asks that RAN immediately review and cease their support for destruction of centuries old ancient trees and their ecosystems. Until RAN does so, there is no chance the world’s forests will be protected, and global ecological sustainability achieved. Clearly the time has come for RAN to unite and work with others on an ecologically sufficient campaign to end industrial, first-time ancient forest logging — the Earth’s climate and species depend upon it. Please note, there are two different protest emails to send. Please send Ran’s Revel sponsors emails to let them know how FSC should not be endorsed by RAN. http://www.rainforestportal.org/shared/alerts/send.aspx?id=ran_ancient_forest_logging

21) RAN Claim: Recently one of our old NGO allies, Ecological Internet, the parent organization of Rainforest Portal, has directly contacted a number of our supporters and allies. Our organizations have a strategic difference of opinion, and Ecological Internet has recently decided to divert the attention of the environmental movement away from protecting forests and towards attacking RAN and other NGOs. This note is to offer our side of the issue and request your patience with any inconvenience caused by Ecological Internet’s internet campaign. Please feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns. EI’s response: Ecological internet carries out a wide array of protests regarding climate and forests — all based upon the latest ecological science and what is known regarding requirements for global ecological sustainability. When we has two staff persons, and ran nearly two dozen, we hardly feel that several hundred emails constituting a protest should have aggrieved RAN quite so deeply. This is the 3rd protest targeting RAN in the past year, and we have yet to receive a detailed response to the core concerns regarding FSC. You will find nothing in their most recent response which defends their notion that cutting ancient forests with FSC certification somehow protects them. Only the suggestion they have been victimized and subtle villificaiton of the messenger. A full list of our recent campaigns, the only one which targets NGOs being this FSC campaign, can be found at http://www.ecoearth.info/shared/alerts/ . RAN Claim: Does RAN support ancient forest logging? No, RAN absolutely does not support logging ancient forests. Our Old Growth Campaign works to protect ancient forests and defend the rights of their inhabitants. EI’s response: RAN is a member and vocal supporter of FSC which has certified as environmentally acceptable the first time logging of hundreds of millions of hectares of primary forests — mostly rainforests. By definition, once logged primary forests are destroyed. They will never again have fully intact function, structure or composition — in effect they are to become tree plantations. At least 60% of FSC timber comes from such first time logging of ancient forests. Until recently, ran inaccurately characterized FSC as being “sustainable” on their web site, illustrating their lack of ecological know-how. RAN most definitely supports logging of ancient forests, because they support FSC which provides the “certificate” saying it is okay, and validates a huge industry that cuts the last ancient forests to make your yard furniture. Their denial is simply not true! http://www.ecologicalinternet.org/

22) A number of broad issues relating to the impact of taxation incentives for the establishment carbon sink forests were examined during the committee’s consideration of this legislation. These included: 1) the impact on prime agricultural land; 2) the impact on rural communities and industries; 3) enforceability of carbon sequestration property rights over consecutive landowners; 4) the permanency of new plantings; 5) the requirement that plantings be contiguous; 6) incentives for biodiverse planting; 7) the potential for undesirable taxation outcomes; 8) the need for the tax incentives; 9) Managed Investment Schemes; and 10) recognition of other forms of carbon stores. – The members of the committee were unable to agree on issues raised during the inquiry, so this report includes two dissenting reports [Abstract from APO]. http://enviro-agri.blogspot.com/2008/09/implementation-operation-and.html

23) It is alarming that indigenous peoples’ fears and objections have now been confirmed by the UN-REDD Framework Document itself. On page 4 and 5 it blatantly states that the program could “deprive communities of their legitimate land-development aspirations, that hard-fought gains in forest management practices might be wasted, that it could cause the lock-up of forests by decoupling conservation from development, or erode culturally rooted not-for-profit conservation values.” An estimated 60 million indigenous peoples are completely dependent on forests and are considered the most threatened by REDD. Therefore, indigenous leaders are among its most prominent critics. The International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change declared that: ‘…REDD will steal our land… States and carbon traders will take control over our forests.’ It is further highlighted that “REDD benefits in some circumstances may have to be traded off against other social, economic or environmental benefits.” In carefully phrased UN language, the document further acknowledges that REDD could cause severe human rights violations and be disastrous for the poor because it could “marginalize the landless…and those with… communal use-rights”. This is tantamount to the UN recognizing that REDD could undermine indigenous peoples and local communities rights to the usage andownership of their lands. Could it be that the UN is paving the way for a massive land grab? To read UN-REDD Framework Document: http://www.undp.org/mdtf/UN-REDD/docs/Annex-A-Framework-Document.pdf – http://www.huntingtonnews.net/political/080929-staff-politicalclimatechange.html

24) It was a classic David versus Goliath moment. At the December 2007 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali, Kevin Conrad challenged the U.S., the sole holdout on a plan for a post-2012 climate treaty. “If, for some reason, you’re not willing to lead, leave it to the rest of us,” he declared. “Please, get out of the way!” Within minutes, the U.S. backed down. The resulting “Bali Action Plan” provides a road map for an international climate treaty that will succeed the Kyoto Protocol. The Bali agreement was significant for Conrad, who was there as Papua New Guinea’s Special Envoy for Climate Change, because it contained provisions for which he’d fought for years. For the first time, the U.N. Climate Treaty agreed to recognize the role of tropical forests and deforestation in tackling global warming. This issue has long been central to Conrad, 40, who was raised in a small village deep in the rain forests of Papua New Guinea. He first addressed deforestation as a graduate student at Columbia University. While there, he sought my assistance on how the international community can provide incentives for conserving rain forests. He knew that without payment for environ-mental services, which have been excluded from current climate-change agreements, countries like Papua New Guinea simply cannot protect their forests. Momentum quickly shifted after Conrad secured the support of two visionary leaders, Prime Minister Michael T. Somare of Papua New Guinea and President Oscar Arias Sánchez of Costa Rica. Making the case that deforestation in the developing world accounts for 20% of global greenhouse-gas emissions, Somare and Arias have called for countries that preserve their rain forests to be compensated. http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1841778_1841779,00.html

25) The leaders of Nauru and Suriname, two developing nations struggling to protect their vulnerable environments from the ravages wrought by climate change, issued a call to the General Assembly today for increased assistance to boost their resilience to the effects of global warming. Phosphate mining has stripped Nauru of its farmable land, and greenhouse gas emissions are leading to a sea level rise – one metre in this century by conservative estimates – that will flood the remaining habitable terrain, President Marcus Stephen told the Assembly’s high-level debate. “Our people will be literally trapped between the rising sea and an ancient, uninhabitable coral field,” he said. But Mr. Stephen said that “the cost of rehabilitating 80 per cent of our lands is well beyond our immediate means,” appealing for support from the United Nations, along with other donors, to help restore Nauru. Similarly, Runaldo Ronald Venetiaan, President of Suriname, urged increased funding to help the South American nation maintain its forests. Due to its low deforestation rates, he said that his country is “g.” However, he stressed “the importance of new financing mechanisms, since good management of forests and other natural resources cannot and should not be at the expense of the development of our own peoples, the peoples of countries with high forest coverage and low deforestation rates.” http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=28245&Cr=general+assembly&Cr1=debate

26) In their study now published in PLoS Biology, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Tubingen have shown that certain small sections of genes, so-called microRNAs, coordinate growth and aging processes in plants. These microRNAs inhibit certain regulators, known as TCP transcription factors. These transcription factors in turn influence the production of jasmonic acid, a plant hormone. The higher the number of microRNAs present, the lower the number of transcription factors that are active, and the smaller the amount of jasmonic acid, which is produced by the plant. The plant therefore ages more slowly, as this hormone is important for the plant’s aging processes. The researchers have succeeded for the first time in describing the antagonistic regulation of growth and aging in plants. Since the quantity of microRNAs in the plants can be controlled by genetic methods, it may be possible in future to cultivate plants that live longer and grow faster. (PLoS Biology, September 23, 2008) MicroRNAs are short, single-strand sections of genes that regulate other genes. They do this by binding to complementary sections of the genetic material, thus preventing them from being read and implemented in genetic products. In plants, microRNAs mainly inhibit other regulators, so-called transcription factors. These factors can switch genes on or off by binding to DNA sections, thus activating or blocking them so that either too many or too few proteins are formed. Since proteins control metabolic processes, an imbalance leads to more or less clearly visible changes to the plant. http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Formula_Discovered_For_Longer_Plant_Life_999.html

27) The study showed that when phosphorus or nitrogen — which occur naturally in rain forest soils — were added to forest plots in Costa Rica, they caused an increase in carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere by about 20 percent annually, said Cleveland. “The study is important because human activities are changing the amount of phosphorus and nitrogen in ecosystems all over the globe, including the tropics,” Cleveland said. “Tropical rain forests play a dominant role on Earth in regulating atmospheric carbon dioxide.” One big question, said Cleveland, “is how tropical rain forests are responding to climate change. What we have demonstrated is that even small changes in nutrients could have a profound impact on the release of carbon dioxide from tropical forest soils.” The study, which took place in 2004 and 2005 in Costa Rica’s Golfo Dulce Forest Reserve, included a series of 25 meter-square plots that were fertilized with phosphorus, nitrogen, or a combination of the two. Tropical forests contain up to 40 percent of the carbon stored on Earth’s continents and account for at least one-third of the annual exchange of carbon dioxide between the biosphere and the atmosphere, said Cleveland. Earth’s soils are believed to store several times more carbon than all the planet’s vegetation. “This is the first time anyone has taken a close look at how changes in key nutrients may alter soil carbon dioxide emissions in tropical forests,” said Cleveland. “Processes in the tropics affect what is happening around the globe, so this study has some big implications.” Phosphorus is known as a “limiting nutrient” because its availability can govern the growth rate of many organisms. While slash-and-burn agriculture in the tropics often reduces soil phosphorus in the long run, the practice can initially make more phosphorus available to tropical soil microbes, increasing their metabolism and the amounts of carbon dioxide they emit. Phosphorus and many other nutrients are regularly transported around the Earth by global wind patterns, sometimes riding on huge transcontinental dust clouds, said Townsend. “There is strong evidence that humans are increasing the size of these dust clouds as changes occur in both land-use patterns and climate, which in turn can alter the availability of nutrients to forests,” he said. http://www.brightsurf.com/news/headlines/25028/Tropical_rainforest_nutrients_linked_to_global_carbon_dioxide_levels.html

28) There are at least three ways in which the presence of forests affected the ways in which wars or battles were fought. The first two, both applicable mainly on the tactical level, are obvious enough: forests served as an obstacle to movement, especially of cavalry and artillery, and provided concealment or cover, especially to infantry or irregular forces. The third way is not so obvious: dense forests affected the way in which societies conceived of war, prepared for it, and practiced it. Forests, especially dense ones, inhibited the free movement of armies from the earliest times onward. Caesar’s legions complained of the dark woods of Gaul, and worked hard to build roads through them to ease transport. Clausewitz in Chapter 21 of his famous military manual On War, explained how field commanders might make use of forests, and how above all they should, when on the defensive stay clear of thick forests so as not to fight “like a blind man against one with his eyesight.” Clever commanders could exploit forest barriers to offset enemy advantages in numbers or firepower. General Robert E. Lee did just this at Chancellorsville in early May of 1863, one of the many battles of the American Civil War fought in northern Virginia. Outnumbered nearly 2 to 1 by the Army of the Potomac under Gen Joseph Hooker, Lee divided his forces, gambling that Hooker would not venture out of the dense woods locally known as The Wilderness. Hooker, having forgotten his Clausewitz, obliged. Unaware of the scale and meaning of Lee’s movements, he allowed Lee’s right arm, Gen. Stonewall Jackson, to achieve a surprise attack on the weakest part of the Union front. Lee relied on the forests to inhibit his opponent’s movement, and his information, in what is often termed his greatest victory. Relying on forests to stymie enemy movements was always a risky gamble. While it worked for Lee it did not save France from German invasion in 1940. In the 1930s, the French had invested heavily in fortifications along the Franco-German border (the Maginot Line) and expected an eventual German attack along a broad front, along the lines of what had happened in the previous German invasion in 1914. The French Army had arranged its defenses in anticipation of war on the theory that the Wehrmacht would not be able to penetrate the Ardennes forest in Belgium in strength. Indeed the French Army was influential enough in the Third Republic to mandate forest preservation on the north-eastern frontiers of France in order to improve its defenses.31 Marshall Pétain, the prestigious French hero of World War I, claimed the Ardennes forest would prove impenetrable, as indeed it would have to an army advancing along a broad front. But the Germans instead drove armored units right through the Ardennes, along paved roads, quickly punctured the French line, ignoring the state-of-the-art defenses of the Maginot Line, and soon defeated France in June of 1940. http://warandgame.wordpress.com/2008/09/24/forests-in-war-fighting/

29) Friends of the Earth (FoE) is the first major international NGO to confirm they no longer support Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification [search], which falsely suggests primary and old-growth forest logging is desirable and even sustainable. This is a major victory for those including Ecological Internet (EI) and FSC-Watch[1] who have courageously taken on large environmental interests using FSC to greenwash ancient forest destruction. FoE pioneered timber certification during the 1980s and was one of FSC’s founders, but FoE International in Amsterdam has confirmed that it is now “reviewing” its membership of the organization. FoE UK announced on their website[2] they are “deeply concerned by the number of FSC certifications that are now sparking controversy and threatening the credibility of the scheme. We cannot support a scheme that fails to guarantee high environmental and social standards. As a result we can no longer recommend the FSC standard.” “FoE is to be commended for their courage in admitting all forest certification schemes including FSC are failing forests, climate and peoples globally. FSC plantation and ancient forest logging standards have been shown to be a fraud — business as usual forest destruction. We welcome reports that other European NGOs may follow FoE’s lead, and demand that Rainforest Action Network, Greenpeace and WWF stop their stonewalling and follow suit, or face escalating disruptive protests” warns Dr. Glen Barry, Ecological Internet’s President. EI has long sought protection for all the Earth’s remaining primary and old-growth forests. These efforts were stymied by large environmental bureaucracies falsely suggesting cutting carbon and species rich, centuries old trees is an environmental good. It became obvious the world’s forests could only be protected, and global ecological sustainability achieved, if groups supporting FSC were confronted. Our protest campaign launched last year, assisted by recent overwhelming ecological science showing old-growth forests continue to store and remove carbon and are essential to fighting climate change[3]. http://www.rainforestportal.org/issues/2008/09/friends_of_the_earth_rejects_f.asp [1] For more information see http://www.fsc-watch.org/ [2] See their statement at: http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/faqs/sustainable_timber_fsc.html [3] See earlier EI release at:http://forests.org/blog/2008/09/feature-old-growth-carbon-find.asp

30) The birds of the world are in serious trouble, and common species are in now decline all over the globe, a comprehensive new review suggests today. From the turtle doves of Europe to the vultures of India, from the bobwhite quails of the US to the yellow cardinals of Argentina, from the eagles of Africa to the albatrosses of the Southern Ocean, the numbers of once-familiar birds are tumbling everywhere, according to the study from the conservation partnership BirdLife International. Their falling populations are compelling evidence of a rapid deterioration in the global environment that is affecting all life on earth — including human life, BirdLife says in its report, State of The World’s Birds. The report, released today with an accompanying website at the BirdLife World Conservation Conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, identifies many key global threats, including the intensification of industrial-scale agriculture and fishing, the spread of invasive species, logging, and the replacement of natural forest with monocultural plantations. It goes on to suggest that in the long term, human-induced climate change may be the most serious stress. Based in Cambridge, BirdLife International is a global alliance of conservation organisations working in more than 100 countries and territories which is now the leading authority on the status of birds, their habitats and the issues and problems affecting them. When brought together, as in its new report, the regional pictures of bird declines combine to present a startling picture of a whole class of living things on a steep downward slope. A remarkable 45 per cent of common European birds are declining, with the familiar European turtle dove, for example, having lost 62 per cent of its population in the last 25 years, while on the other side of the globe, resident Australian wading birds have seen population losses of 81 per cent in the same period. Twenty common North American birds have more than halved in number in the last four decades, while in Asia, the millions of white-rumped vultures which once filled the skies have crashed by 99.9 per cent and the species is now critically endangered. “Many of these birds have been a familiar part of our everyday lives, and people who would not necessarily have noticed other environmental indicators have seen their numbers slipping away, and are wondering why,” said Dr Mike Rands, BirdLife’s chief executive. http://www.rainforestportal.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=106996

31) A new sensor system developed by Voltree Power uses the energy produced by trees to wirelessly transmit signals with information about forest fires. The system is powered by off-the-shelf batteries that are slowly charged by the small amounts of electricity produced by trees. Scientists only recently discovered that trees produce energy generated from an imbalance in pH between a tree and its surrounding soil. The forest fire warning sensor is the first real-world application of this knowledge. The system wirelessly transmits information about temperature and humidity four times a day from sensor to sensor until the info reaches a weather station that beams the data by satellite to a forestry center in Idaho. Voltree’s sensor is a big improvement over current forest fire warning technologies. Remote automated weather stations are expensive, and manually recharging batteries at hard-to-reach locations is costly. In contrast, the Voltree system maintains itself and only requires cheap batteries. And with forest fires getting bigger and more out of control every year, fire-prone areas will welcome the arrival of the tree-powered sensor. http://cleantechnica.com/2008/09/22/forest-fire-warning-system-derives-power-from-trees/

32) The human effect on forest ecology is quite profound. While you could make a case for the destruction that may causes by simply walking into the forest, there is much worse done. Some of the common problems in local forests, national forest and even much larger forests include these: 1) Small, local forests are important to the local environment yet many are overrun with litter and debris. This causes a breakdown in the ecosystem and often leads to potential long term effects on the living environment. 2) Ecotourism has hurt many of the larger forests. Even national forests that are well protected have changed considerably due to the tourism of people. Tourism changes the landscape and often destroys part of the ecosystem in the process. 3) Deforestation is a large problem in many areas of the country. The search for wood is detrimental to the livelihood of the forest. Often times, when forests are wiped out due to foresting, they are not replanted, which destroys an entire habitat for animals and microorganisms. – Forest ecology is an important topic. Since trees are a natural beauty and they provide support for the larger ecosystem contained under their canopy, it is very harsh to believe that these forests are unimportant. What is important is having protection and special care to better save these forests for generations to come. http://safefornature.com/ecology/studying-forest-ecology