LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Deforestation: Governments
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Given that land use changes and deforestation account annually for one fifth of greenhouse gas emissions, there is broad consensus on the need to tackle this. But concerns abound on the proposed design and impacts of the FCPF, which are still unclear. Without adequate consultation or prior strengthening of community land tenure rights and forest law enforcement capacity, the FCPF could merely create a new source of revenue for logging companies, governments, and investors without securing genuine long-term reductions in carbon emissions and protection of forest resources from degradation, or equitable benefits for the poor (especially forest-dependent communities). It is ... questionable whether the five country-pilot projects for the carbon finance mechanism currently have sufficient capacity to enforce avoided deforestation commitments, given their poor record in forest governance.
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This collection of essays analyzes the forces responsible for deforestation, the governmental policies that effect this destruction and the roles multilateral aid agencies, NGOs, play in the environmental debate. The collection critically examines the principles and criteria suggested by forest-experts for a sustained economic growth vis-à-vis forest stewardship in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. An invaluable resource for scholars, students, researchers, and policymakers involved with environmental and public policy issues.
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It should be emphasized that it is seldom the production of food for the poor which causes deforestation, as the largest areas of forests converted to other uses are currently being dedicated to the production of cash crops and cattle. These products, which vary from coffee and beef to coca and soy bean, are in many cases almost exclusively produced for export markets in OECD countries. It is absurd to defend the production of these goods with arguments about food security, as some governments and international institutions (including the FAO) do, since Northern countries have excessively high levels of consumption.
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According to CIFOR, careful examination reveals that complex, indirect forces are often more important than the logging and slash and burn activities popularly understood as the main causes of deforestation. Forces such as fluctuations in international commodity prices; agricultural and, more recently, biofuel subsidies; and roads and other infrastructure projects can encourage forest clearing. Deeply ingrained and routinely corrupt government practices often favor large corporate interests over community rights to forest resources.
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It is clear from the very fact that deforestation has taken place on such a huge scale that ecological sustainability has not been given priority. Instead, as is recognised in the literature of the Tropical Forestry Action Plan (T.F.A.P.), "commercial exploitation" and "Large-scale development projects in agriculture and other sectors, including projects funded by international development agencies"(6) have been allowed to cause deforestation. The goal of profitability overrides that of sustainability. The governments of developing nations desperately need revenue and will usually accept new investment from industries which cause deforestation.(7).
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In forested areas, tenure policies ... have an important role to play in reducing deforestation pressures. Governments need to implement several reforms, such as eliminating the practice of requiring proof of land clearing in order to obtain legal title or credit, ending support of formal and informal colonization efforts in areas without agricultural potential, defending and enforcing protected areas, and designing creative tenure arrangements to preserve forest lands. Among the latter, priority should be given to strengthening formal property rights among indigenous and other traditional communities, granting logging concessions in favor of local forest dwellers, and establishing restricted private property rights over forest areas that cannot be appropriately safeguarded under public ownership. In addition, governments should promote pilot efforts to enact local land taxes with higher rates for pasture and crop lands than for forest uses.
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