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SINGAPORE – Look out the window and you will probably see one of the most effective weapons in the fight against climate change: a tree.
Trees absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2), which warms the planet as they grow and produce oxygen in return. On a large scale, forests are huge reserves of carbon and help regulate the climate by capturing and releasing water for rivers and clouds. Forests also provide livelihoods for millions of people in local communities.
Scientists say that if policies are well defined, forests, as well as grasslands, mangroves and wetlands – even carefully managed farmland – can become powerful tools that can absorb more CO2 and water. save time to avoid dangerous climate change.
The problem is that humanity has reduced forests, especially in the tropics, at an alarming rate, mainly for agriculture. The temptation to profit from products such as beef, soybean, palm oil, timber and population growth means that land clearing often takes precedence over conservation and climate change concerns.
This is an irony, since widespread clearing is driving up local temperatures and as rising global temperatures in turn provoke more forest fires. However, major forest countries such as Indonesia, Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) could limit these risks by playing a major role in the use of nature to combat climate change in Africa. absorbing excess CO2.
"Tropical forest countries should be the highest priority, not only because they retain a lot of carbon and absorb each year, but also because tropical forests also act as a global air conditioner," said Deborah Lawrence, professor of environmental sciences. at the University of Virginia in the United States.
"Forest protection provides a positive feedback: large forest areas promote rainfall and create a wetter and cooler environment, improving the state of the forest." This environment is less likely to produce fires and more to produce higher crop yields and healthier people. "
Plants and soils absorb about 20% of humanity's greenhouse gas emissions, although this is offset by emissions from land-use change, including land clearing and agricultural activities, according to a study published last year in the journal Proceedings of the US National Academy of Sciences. .
But in their analysis, the authors estimated that stopping deforestation, forest restoration and improved forest practices could cost-effectively eliminate 7 billion tons of CO2 per year, or as much as Elimination of 1.5 billion cars.
Scientists have been urging governments and businesses for years to consider these benefits as a way to slow the pace of climate change. What is needed is better conservation, land management practices and law enforcement.
Putting a price on the value of nature can also help.
With mixed results, some banks and lending agencies have supported market mechanisms that value every tonne of CO2 contained in a protected forest area.
Costa Rica pays landowners the opportunity to replant trees and conserve them in the watersheds of hydroelectric dams.
But much remains to be done to encourage forest nations to become aware of the climatic value of trees.
Last year was the second-highest record ever recorded for tree cover loss in the tropics, down slightly from 2016. The tropics lost a forest area the size of Vietnam in 2016-17 wrote Frances Seymour, a senior member of the Washington World Resources Institute (WRI) based on a blog in June.
Last year, tropical forest loss amounted to 15.8 million hectares, about the size of Bangladesh. Brazil lost 4.52 million hectares, the DRC 1.47 million hectares and Indonesia 1.3 million hectares, according to data from the University of Maryland. The main causes are deforestation for agriculture, more serious and frequent fires and storms.
In other words, if tropical deforestation was a country, it would rank third in CO2 emissions after China and the United States, says the WRI, highlighting the scale of the problem, but also the solution if deforestation is stopped.
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