PARIS (AFP) — Governments worldwide are using the Covid-19 pandemic to push through destructive development projects and roll back protections of indigenous groups, according to a global report on deforestation and rule of law released Thursday.
In their quest to bolster economies battered by the pandemic, governments in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere have set aside social and environmental safeguards in favor of destructive development projects that are harming Indigenous communities and the forests they care for, according to a report released today by Forest Peoples Programme.
In the forests of the Congo Basin, rising temperatures and erratic rainfall are adversely affecting wildlife resources. The availability of edible mushrooms and caterpillars has fallen by about 80%. This is according to a study published on 5 January 2021 by the Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR).
The Congo Basin contains the world's second-largest rainforest, crucial for regulating the world's climate. Inside it, a plan to halt the forest's decline is bearing fruit.
With a gentle tug of his left hand, Patrick Wasa-Nziabo eases dozens of kernels from a sun-dried cob and into a large plastic bucket brimming with lemon-yellow corn at his bare feet.
Civil society organisations (CSOs) working on the environment and human rights have expressed concern about filling parts of Boeung Tamok Lake to create new parcels of land on the outskirts of Phnom Penh.
Located in Prek Pnov district’s Kouk Roka commune, Boeung Tamok, also known as Kob Srov Lake, is the largest lake remaining within the municipal borders with an area of more than 3,000ha.
Main photo: young oil palms await planting on land deforested by South Korea’s Korindo in the Indonesian province of Papua (Image: Mighty Earth)
In 2019, South Korea imported 745,000 metric tonnes of palm oil, up from 194,000 metric tonnes in 2005. It is one of the fastest-growing markets for the commodity in the world, driven by government policies to boost palm oil as a lucrative green industry and to secure food and energy supplies from overseas.
The (online) course runs between 15 Feb and 05 March 2021 in close collaboration with Freiburg Academy of Continuing Education (FRAUW), UNIQUE Forestry and Land Use & other renowned forest carbon experts (Solidaridad etc.).
IMPORTANT TO KNOW: The course will be held online this year (due to the pandemic restrictions) and there will be reduced fee opportunities for participants without institutional support or with low income.
The Cardamom Mountains sit off the Gulf of Thailand in southern Cambodia and provide important habitat for a multitude of plant and animal species, many of them already threatened with extinction.
Due to Cardamoms’ remoteness, they had largely been spared the human encroachment that has razed much of the rainforest across the country – until infrastructure development in 2020 opened up the area to loggers, poachers, and others seeking to exploit the region’s forests.
Despite recent advancements in land reforms across Africa, women and girls are still hugely disadvantaged, according to a recent meeting of experts. The 2020 Africa Land Forum (ALC), which took place online between 15 and 17 September, brought together 500 participants to explore the theme ‘Delivering on the African Union Agenda 2063 by Promoting People-Centered Land Governance in Africa’.
Kagenal Incorporated Land Group (ILG) a group in the Central Inland Pomio (CIP) LLG in Pomio district of East New Britain will be receiving 52 per cent revenue of a project that is underway in their LLG.
The project is known as Reducing Emission Deforestation Degradation (REDD+) operating under a company, Night Incorporate, which is an American corporation that operates in the country in partnership with the LLG specialising in carbon trade credit.
CIP LLG has preserved 60 000 square kilometers of land for reforestation under this project.
