368 EU-Africa-Mid-East
–Germany: 4) Economics of Climate Change, 5) 500 million Euros for tropical forests,
–Lebanon: 6) Forest cover at 13% & efforts to maintain it
–Congo: 7) Conservation and forestation
–Eritrea: 8) Forest plantation stats.
–Kenya: 9) “Sustainable” paper company faces collapse due to lack of raw material?
UK:
1) The short animated film, called Reliable and tidy hoverfly looking for a place to live was made and directed by three young film-makers, and was commissioned by the Woodland Trust. It marks the first complete year of its Ancient Tree Hunt, a five-year project to find and record 100,000 ancient trees in the UK. The film illustrates why such trees are so important as wildlife habitats, with holes, dead and rotting wood, wrinkles and crannies all important habitats for hundreds of plants, animals, insects and fungi, including many rare and threatened species. Using animation with characters made of paper, recycled cardboard and other recovered materials, it tells the story of a hoverfly that wants to move into an old tree and is looking for the perfect spot to live. He is befriended by a click beetle who introduces him to the other inhabitants, the inner workings, relationships and survival mechanisms of the interior of a hollow, ancient tree. The film will be shown at the Woodland Trust’s stand in the Exploring Nature zone. This summer, the Ancient Tree Hunt organised its ‘Summer of Hugs’ to get more people out looking for ancient trees. The Trust will be taking its hugs to Blenheim and running lessons in tree-hugging. Hugging is an easy way to measure the girth of old trees; one of several indicators of age. http://www.fwi.co.uk/blogs/rural-life/2008/07/ok-its-not-indiana-jones-but.html
2) Do these trees look dead, dying or dangerous to you? Well in their wisdom our friends at Bristol City Council have decided to allow the felling of these trees in Grove Wood next to Blackberry Hill. We have contacted the media to tell them of our opposition to this decision. We are organising a PEACEFUL and LEGAL protest to demonstrate our concern on Monday 7th July from 5.30pm. If you want to get involved please email us at snuffmills@hotmail.co.uk If you want to know Bristol’s reasoning for this decision, here is the letter they are sending to the hundred or so people that objected: http://snuffmills.blogspot.com/2008/07/goodbye-blackberry-trees.html
3) The saga began when the businessman and his wife Gillian moved into a £750,000 house in Woolverstone, Suffolk, in 2004. He set about clearing the overgrown parts of the 2.83 acres of land which came with the house, with the aim of planting oak and beech trees and returning it to its condition of 50 years ago. But Forestry Commission officials objected when his contractor uprooted alder saplings that had begun growing wild on the land. Mr Rockall claimed before Lowestoft magistrates that Environment Department rules did not require him to have a licence to cut down trees in his own garden. But magistrates decided the overgrown land had ‘ceased to be a garden’ and convicted him. The legal battle ended yesterday when Lord Justice Moses, sitting with Mr Justice Blake, overturned the conviction, saying that the definition of a garden has become much broader in modern times. Mr Rockall’s barrister, Dominic Grieve, QC, said a previous owner had allowed the land to run wild. Lord Justice Moses said: ‘The Oxford English Dictionary states that a garden is an enclosed piece of ground devoted to the cultivation of flowers, fruit or vegetables. ‘That definition is clearly now too narrow, as the current fashion for wild gardens and meadow areas amply demonstrates. ‘The reality is that no description will categorically establish whether a piece of land is a garden or not. It is incumbent on the fact finder to determine its use. ‘It is important to look at the relationship between the owner and the land, and the history and character of the land and space.’ The judge added: ‘It has been contended that the garden was so disused that it had ceased to be a garden – I have some doubts about that. ‘Did it cease to be a garden because the owner went abroad and the occupier had neither the means nor the intention to keep it well maintained? There will be many of us that inherit land and are unable to maintain it in the way our forefathers kept it, through insufficient time or money. ‘The fact that the previous owner didn’t have the need or desire for the land as a gardener and that the owner went abroad didn’t mean that the garden ceased to be one.’ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1032112/When-garden-garden-Judges-better-definition.html
Germany:
4) The European Commission has recently launched a report on the economics of ecosystems and biodiversity. This report was inspired by the momentum created by the Stern Review of the Economics of Climate Change and it was proposed by the German Government. The purpose of this study was to initiate the process of analyzing the global economic benefit of biological diversity, the costs of the loss of biodiversity and the failure to take protective measures versus the costs of effective conservation. http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/biodiversity/economics/pdf/teeb_report.pdf
5) German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s recent pledge of 500 million Euros over four years to conserve tropical forests, followed by increased annual spending on forest protection, starts to address a major source of greenhouse gas emissions causing climate change. As Chancellor Merkel notes, tropical forests are home to biological diversity and healthy ecosystems that strengthen Earth’s resilience to global warming and help people adapt to the changing climate. The burning and clearing of tropical forests contributes 20 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions – more than all the world’s cars, trucks and airplanes combined. Emissions from deforestation, rather than industrial discharges, make developing countries Brazil and Indonesia two of the world’s top four greenhouse gas polluters. However, less than 1 percent of current investments in the global carbon market created by the Kyoto Protocol target forest-related solutions. Germany’s G8 partners – the United States, Britain, Canada, France, Italy, Japan and Russia – can help correct that imbalance by making pledges similar to Merkel’s and promoting forest conservation as an important and viable way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. “Halting deforestation is an immediate and cost-effective way to cut greenhouse gas emissions,” said Peter Seligmann, the chairman and CEO of Conservation International (CI). “Solutions for climate change that don’t include the conservation of carbon sinks such as tropical forests and oceans will fail to reduce greenhouse gas emissions enough to prevent catastrophic impacts from rising global temperatures.” Tropical forests are home to more than half the species on Earth and harbor vital resources such as fresh water, food and medicines directly depended on by local communities, often the most vulnerable and poorest of society. http://www.netnewspublisher.com/german-initiative-to-conserve-forests-offers-win-win-solution/
Lebanon:
6) CHOUF: Covering 13 percent of the country, they are a unique green area in the Middle East, and attract tourists from around the world. The cedars of Lebanon are much loved, but they have had a difficult time lately. Last year, 4,700 hectares of forest were destroyed in fires, including 1,500 hectares as the worst blazes raged on October 2. There is no national plan for managing forest fires in an emergency, and driving through Beiteddine into the mountains, the view is not of forests, but of hundreds of burnt trees. But on Thursday, the Association for Forests, Development and Conservation (AFDC) showcased several new reforestation programs and prevention measures which have been funded by the EU. AFDC director Sawsan Abou Fakhreddine hopes that with the 350,000 euro ($550,000) grant the AFDC can not only buy equipment for their firefighters and 300 volunteers but, more importantly, set up a central forest fire operations room to co-ordinate action in a crisis. “We will never be able to prevent fires,” she said at the Chouf cedar reserve, “but we hope to be able to limit their impact a little bit, and to control the times when they can break out.” She champions local campaigns to raise awareness that fires can start when broken glass is left as litter and focuses sunlight, although she adds that not all fires are accidents. Even nature in Lebanon is not immune to politics. “People here are sometimes politically opposed to a municipality,” she said, “and so they start a fire in the area.” The main objective of the project is to set up an early warning system. The operations center will be based in Beirut and will be managed by the Civil Defense forces who will work alongside staff from the Lebanese Army, the Internal Security Forces and representatives from the Environment, Agriculture and Interior ministries. They will work to monitor fires, to warn of outbreaks and to co-ordinate volunteers and troops to fight them. http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=1&article_id=93813
Congo:
7) Conserving the Congo forest, and indeed all of our forests in Africa, as well as accelerating forestation efforts, is vital to our survival on a continent where the Sahara Desert is expanding to the North and the Kalahari Desert is expanding to the Southwest. For this reason the Congo Basin Forest Fund (CBFF) was launched in London on June 17. The initial financing of the CBFF comes from a pair of $200 million grants from the governments of the United Kingdom and Norway. Ten countries in the Central African region established the Congo Basin Forest Initiative to manage the forest more sustainably and conserve its rich biodiversity. The Congo Basin Forest is the world’s second largest forest ecosystem and is considered the planet’s second lung, after the Amazon. The forests of the Congo Basin provide food, shelter, and livelihood for over 50 million people. Covering 200 million hectares and including approximately one-fifth of the world’s remaining closed-canopy tropical forest, they are also a very significant carbon store with a vital role in regulating the regional climate. The diversity they harbour is of global importance. Spanning an area twice the size of France, the Congo Basin rainforest is home to more than 10,000 species of plants, 1,000 species of birds, and 400 species of mammals. Today, the Congo Basin rainforest is coming under pressure. Increased logging, changing patterns of agriculture, population growth, and the oil and mining industries are all leading to ever greater deforestation. This situation is not sustainable for the people who live there, for the countless species that may be driven to extinction, or for the climate. Reversing the rate of deforestation in the Congo Basin is therefore essential both to securing the livelihoods of the people in the region and to maintaining the carbon-storage capacity and biodiversity of the forest. http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/Opinion/op070720088.htm
Eritrea:
8) At the Ministry of Agriculture, the coordinator of the Community Plantation Program, Mr. Fkreyesus Ghilay, stated that there were 20 nurseries at national and community levels in 2006. However, the number was raised to 30 in 2007. Similarly, the Ministry of Agriculture prepared 3.7 million seedlings in 2007 compared to 1.7 million in 2006. This showed a 117 percentage increase. According to Mr. Fkreyesus, since independence more than 30,000 hectares of land were terraced ad planted with different species of trees and about 200,000 hectares were reserved as green area. Speaking about activities for the year 2008, he said that 34 nurseries are expected to produce 12.3 million seedlings and already 5.6 have been prepared so far. The forest resources in Eritrea are known to be rare, degraded and placed under an increasing human and livestock pressures for divers needs such as firewood, construction materials, grazing and agriculture. It is true that not much forest was left from what was reported to exist even only a century ago. But it is also true that Eritrea is still endowed in many of its parts of a sizeable forest cover that plays an important social and economic role in the nation. The forestry formations, which include the highland forests (Juniperus procera, and Olea africana) which cover about 0.8 %, mixed woodlands of Acacia spp. and associated species, grasslands and woodland, riverine forests and mangrove vegetation cover about 13.5 % of the total surface area of the country. (fao.org) http://www.shaebia.org/artman/publish/article_5518.shtml
Kenya:
9) Paper manufacturer Pan African Paper Mills (Panpaper) is facing collapse due to lack of raw materials. Five years after its long term logging licence expired, the government is yet to renew it. The licence, which allows the company to fell and extract wood from government-owned plantations, expired in December 2003. The government has since then been extending its logging licence annually, forcing the miller to engage in short-term felling of trees. The government owns substantial shares in the company. Last year, Panpaper announced plans to stop the production of bleached paper claiming it was unable to stock enough eucalyptus wood — the main raw material in the manufacture of light grade paper — and Hydrogen peroxide, a chemical used to bleach paper. The intermittent supply of raw materials has forced the company to operate at 35 per cent of its capacity over a number of months. However, to avert a recurrence of the crisis, the company has written to the government, requesting it to grant it a long term logging licence. Meanwhile, Panpaper has proposed to the government to issue it with a five-year felling plan to insulate it from material supply interruptions in the short run. Even as the company makes a formal request to the government to re-introduce long-term logging licences, it has criticised the government for its reluctance to bring into action the Forest Act 2005. The Act, which proposes to replace long-term logging licence with concessioning, would enable Panpaper get raw materials from forest with minimal interruptions. The Act stipulates that concessioning authorities will have to ensure that concession areas are well stocked with trees and that only mature ones are felled. If enacted, Panpaper will develop its own plantations in forest concession areas which it estimates will be 18,000 hectares in Turbo, Lugari, Timboroa and Mt Elgon. Under the arrangement, Panpaper will be allowed to manage forests and harvest trees on concessionary terms within some specified period of time. However, Panpaper’s executive officer Niranjan Saha insists that there is need to ensure forest concessions are sufficiently stocked till such a time when new plantations mature. Mid last month, the company announced the return to normalcy of its operations after last year’s poll violence. Coincidentally, the regions most affected by the poll violence were the company’s major sources of raw materials. This led to a Ksh320 million ($5 million) loss. The company claims it will take time before it recovers from such a “substantial” loss. http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/Business/biz070720084.htm