ENN has a good short piece about the crucial need for deforestation - which accounts for some 20-25% of the world's carbon emissions - to be included in the next climate pact...Kyoto provides incentives for re-planting former forests, but not for preserving the environmental service of carbon uptake provided by existing ones.
The really good news about addressing this need - it will not only help people avoid the nasty economic, health, security, and other impacts of climate change. It will help conserve the plant and animal treasures (many of which remain undiscovered by human kind) that make their homes in these forests.
Time is running short for our tropical forests, with potentially catastrophic impacts to our global climate, as well as to human welfare. Let's hope that efforts to help forest nations provide their citizens with ways to support themselves through conservation, instead of just through extractive activities, are successful!
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