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Deforestation: Governments
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Deforestation can be seen as a local issue with global consequences. Therefore, actors such as NGOs, donor governments, and the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa must work together to combat the problem. While external actors have a role to play in reducing population, they will be more effective in a supporting role. NGOs and Western countries can provide knowledge about the problem of deforestation and techniques to handle the problem, but African countries themselves must take the primary responsibility because ultimately their people are most affected.
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A report by Jubilee Australia explores the influence of IFI interventions on deforestation in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. The IMF rescue package for Indonesia after the 1997 Asian financial crisis, led to the increased exploitation of natural resources in an attempt to raise more revenue. Under IMF pressure in 1998 the Indonesian government lifted a 10 year ban on the export of raw, unfinished logs. Public spending cuts and privatisation of public assets weakened state-run environmental protection measures, leaving forest resources vulnerable to pirate operators. The IMF's package ... required removal of barriers to investment in palm oil, resulting in a rapid spread of palm oil plantations and deforestation to make way for them. The use of clear cut and burn methods to convert rainforest to palm oil plantations has resulted in the dramatic spread forest fires.
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The main cause of deforestation in Ethiopia, located in East Africa, is a growing population and subsequent higher demand for agriculture, livestock production and fuel wood. Other reasons include low education and inactivity from the government, although the current government has taken some steps to tackle deforestation. Organizations such as Farm Africa are working with the federal and local governments to create a system of forest management. Ethiopia, the third largest country in Africa by population, has been hit by famine many times because of shortages of rain and a depletion of natural resources. Deforestation has lowered the chance of getting rain, which is already low, and ... causes erosion. Bercele Bayisa, an Ethiopian farmer, offers one example why deforestation occurs.
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Experts point out a successful deforestation program lies in its design. Two major “flash points” will complicate the deforestation policy debate—accounting for emissions reductions and paying for conservation. Some advocates would like to see emissions-reduction accounting by project, while others believe the only way to prevent deforestation from moving outside project areas is to account for emissions reductions countrywide. Experts say the assumption is that deforestation efforts will join the credit-trading system already underway. However, some people are pushing for a fund that governments would pay into for designated forest conservation. Melnick notes that a fund would be less effective than a market-based mechanism because governments would never put enough money into the fund.
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Although most of these cases have been recognized internationally as problematic areas of deforestation, there has been relatively little action on behalf of the governments to alter the situation. Those rare exceptions have been when natural disaster such as flooding has occurred that it directly contributable to the deforestation. A second scenario for action has been when third parties became involved, such as the Australians in the Solomon Island Case. At this point in time. International trade and money transfer has become so important that it is often difficult for peoples or governments to respect their natural habitat when it is survival of the people or government at stake. It is very difficult to tell a man with a starving family that he can not cut down forest to plant food.
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It is important... to realize that deforestation and forest degradation are not "technical" issues. Forests are not disappearing because people and their governments are ignorant or because there are no proper management plans. Forests are disappearing because a number of interlinked international and national policies prepare the ground for it to happen. It is therefore at that level that solutions must be found. In addition, it is crucial to reach out to the public at large in order to ensure that such changes are actually implemented in a way that both humanity as a whole and the people living in the forest areas benefit from them equally. This is obviously a huge and difficult challenge, but one which opens up some hope for the future.
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