McGrath writes: "Liberia is to become the first nation in Africa to completely stop cutting down its trees in return for development aid. Norway will pay the impoverished West African country $150m (�91.4m) to stop deforestation by 2020."
Several factors have been driving deforestation in the West African country of Liberia. (photo: AFP)
Norway Will Pay Liberia $150 Million if They Stop Deforestation by 2020
23 September 14
�
iberia is to become the first nation in Africa to completely stop cutting down its trees in return for development aid.
Norway will pay the impoverished West African country $150m (�91.4m) to stop deforestation by 2020.
There have been fears that the Ebola crisis would see increased logging in a country desperate for cash.
Norwegian officials confirmed details of the deal to the BBC at the UN climate summit in New York.
Liberia's forests are not as big as other countries but the country is home to a significant part of West Africa's remaining rainforest, with about 43% of the Upper Guinean forest.
It is also a global diversity hotspot, home to the last remaining viable populations of species including western chimpanzees, forest elephants and leopards.
But since the civil war ended in 2003, illegal logging has become rife.
In 2012, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf attracted international criticism when she handed out licences to companies to cut down 58% of all the primary rainforest left in the country. After protests many of those permits were cancelled.
Some researchers have connected the current outbreak of Ebola with the widespread destruction of the forests, bringing people into contact with natural reservoirs of the virus.
Now the Norwegians and the Liberian government have signed a deal that they both believe will protect the forests into the future.
"We hope Liberia will be able to cut emissions and reduce poverty at the same time," said Jens Frolich Holte, a political adviser to the Norwegian government, speaking to the BBC on the sidelines of the UN climate summit in New York.
"We have funded efforts in Indonesia and Brazil, but I think this is the first time we have entered a deal on a country level."
Under the terms of the agreement, Norway will help Liberia to initially build up the capacity to monitor and police the forests.
Liberia will refrain from issuing any new logging concessions until all existing ones have been reviewed by an independent body.
The country agrees to place 30% or more of its forest estate under protected area status by 2020. It will also pilot direct payments to communities for protecting the forest.
Ultimately the Norwegians will pay for results, with independent verification that trees remain standing.
'Cautiously Confident'
The development has been welcomed by environmental campaigners in Liberia.
"This partnership holds promise not only for the forest and climate; but for forest communities that have been marginalised for generations," said Silas Siakor, a Liberian environmental campaigner and Goldman Environmental Prize laureate.
"The partnership's commitment to respecting and protecting community's rights with respect to forests is laudable."
Experts believe that Liberia has turned to logging as a way of raising cash in difficult times. With the current Ebola outbreak having a significant economic impact on the country, the Norwegian deal is timely.
"Our hope is that the situation there now will be contained and resolved," said Mr Frolich Holte.
"But we also need to give Liberia a long term hope for development and that is what this rainforest money will provide for them, a long term vision for a country with reduced poverty and reduced deforestation."
With widespread corruption and a government struggling to impose its authority, campaigners recognise that stopping all the logging in Liberia will not be easy.
"There is the potential for this to go wrong, both Norway and Liberia will have to make sure that this deal does not get affected by corruption, but I am cautiously confident it can be done," said Patrick Alley, the director of campaign group Global Witness.
"It's really good news, it's transformational for Liberia when all the news coming out of there is bad - I think this will be a real boost."
|
THE NEW STREAMLINED RSN LOGIN PROCESS: Register once, then login and you are ready to comment. All you need is a Username and a Password of your choosing and you are free to comment whenever you like! Welcome to the Reader Supported News community. |
Comments
We are concerned about a recent drift towards vitriol in the RSN Reader comments section. There is a fine line between moderation and censorship. No one likes a harsh or confrontational forum atmosphere. At the same time everyone wants to be able to express themselves freely. We'll start by encouraging good judgment. If that doesn't work we'll have to ramp up the moderation.
General guidelines: Avoid personal attacks on other forum members; Avoid remarks that are ethnically derogatory; Do not advocate violence, or any illegal activity.
Remember that making the world better begins with responsible action.
- The RSN Team
Kudos to this judge for what he is quoted as stating here. Hang in there we must, people of any and all colors - ain't going to be easy to overcome all the greed and need for power over all that ensnares us so these 'enslave 'em all' days.
I am glad judges and those involved in these crimes are speaking out more often, and clearly.
--- OMG :O
Teachnet, in a post below, expresses the issue nicely. The U.S. has many problems, and those who run the country use that against the population. Keep everyone squabbling and distracted.
We all hate the violence and killings, but it must be kept in perspective, regardless of the reasons or location.
I say, send them to Fucking Parchman Farm where so many INNOCENT black men (and women) toiled in the hot sun, forced to work harder and harder by similar scumbags-This time in uniform-using clubs, whips, ferocious dogs, and shotguns.
These TEN scumbags deserve whatever they get-and probably worse.
I cannot think of a word that adequately describes a "man" who would treat another human being in such a fashion. Maybe "Nazi" is adequate.
Typical National Propaganda Radio. Admidst the violent atrocities Judge Reeves chronicles in his speech, NPR is worried that its well herded liberal audience will be offended by a single racial epithet.
Amazing. Yet, one very effective way that well funded propaganda keeps a culture pacified, stupified: Undercut what's real and ugly and actionable. Shove it back into the unreality of the TV screen, the history documentary. Refocus the reader onto a single, well worn perjorative, suggesting that it is the only real offense and the rest is just a story. Nothing to see here. Just an exhibit. Move along. Do not revolt. Do not revolt. Focus on the word. Discuss the word. Move along.
Lest you think my point incorrect, take a look at the discussion. Let's "shut down the entire state" of Mississippi, one commentor wrote, as though Mississippi were the sum total of the problem.
Not thinking for ourselves, not THINKING, letting righteous anger at a system that lies and kills for profit be redirected into hatred of each other, is not limited to Mississippi.
It stops when we notice the gatekeepers using their tools.
Thank you, Judge Reeves, for every word.
So eloquently spoken.
Fantastic comment!.
I could not possibly agree more.!!
A comment so great in scope, I'm seriously considering using it in a book I'm writing.- hope you don't mind.
--- Say what???!!! 'well herded liberal (audience)??? You make the term 'liberal' sound like a covert slur; as if liberals were actually closet racists. I object to your characterizatio n and character assassination. True liberals are the good guys, remember? I think you're getting the forest and the trees confused here...
Change always comes, however.
As far as the south dealing with its past, use that as a fine example of how so many countries still suffer from their past.
Suggest you acquirer a copy of "The Warmth of Other Suns" by Isabel Wilkerson -about how blacks leaving The South -and even some of their journeys- found it in other areas and cities of the country.
Even the famously "Liberal" Oregon has a past studded with high KKK activity and Portland is one of the cities I mentioned that is rapidly gentrifying downtown and the formerly predominantly Black areas of N. and N.E. into sterility and high-rent neighborhoods, massively displacing hundreds of black families from areas of true community, to Gawd knows where.
And the Portland police bureau has had it's own recent troubles with shooting unarmed blacks, as well as an openly Nazi Cop-Captain, just reinstated with back ("Vacation") pay after being suspended due to excessive violence in the "colored" areas still left close in.
You'll find this hard to believe, reiverpacific (I'm still incredulous, and I was a participant!)
10-15 years ago, in former KKK-friendly Josephine County, a grand dragon (?) of the Klan arrived, with a few subdragonps, having sent out nationwide adds calling for like-minded "people" to join him here, in order to set up a new-age KKK coven-right here in Orygun!
What is so hard to imagine is the HUMONGOUS number of people who showed up at the local courthouse steps, to PROTEST the KKK, and DEMAND that they get the hell out of Dodge.
And it WORKED-these KLANSTERS left, with their pointy tails between their legs.
We are a way-too-conserv ative, Neanderthal kind of community (we even have a huge caveman "mascot" greeting visitors to Grants Pass, but gradually-VERY gradually-thing s are improving. :)
PS: Portland Hoffa, radio comedienne who was wed to Fred Allen (ne Francis Sullivan), was a member of the same family. I never heard anything bad about her.
Instead, they keep fighting to keep women down, especially in the military and at the work places.
Some of them even call themselves democrats.
Go figure.
Now, that, my friends, is some dangerous Alice in Wonderland counter-reality .
However, once Kennedy/Johnson liberals took over the national scene in 1960, the GOP rushed to pick up the racist ideology that the Democrats had put behind them.
And so it remains to this day.
In 50s Florida there were a few white liberals of both parties whose homes got bombed as "N--- Lovers" but as I recall most were young Democrats who didn't get re-elected.
Knowing about a few ethical Democrats didn't stop me from registering Republican when I turned 21 in 1957. I wanted to distance myself entirely from the Dixiecrats that harbored the KKK and the White Citizens' Councils. I resigned to bcomee an Independent in 1964 after watching the Goldwater Convention on TV and running to the bathroom to barf a few times.
Peace
PS: Portland Hoffa, radio comedienne who was wed to Fred Allen (ne Francis Sullivan), was a member of the same family. I never heard anything bad about her.