The problems with large-scale carbon sink plantations

Copies of this summaries of findings on researches published by the World Rainforest Movement (WRM) are being distributed among gubernmental delegates and participants at the United Nations Climate Change Conference that is being held in Nairobi from November 6 to 17.

Tree plantations have been included in the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism as being capable of serving as carbon sinks and therefore eligible for carbon credits. Independently from the debate about whether that is true or not, it is important to note that in the context of this Convention tree plantations have been analysed under the perspective of the trees’ capacity to store atmospheric carbon, mostly ignoring the already proven social and environmental impacts of existing large-scale tree plantations.

The World Rainforest Movement therefore wishes to share its research findings about those impacts, which include the appropriation of extensive areas of local communities’ land, net losses of work opportunities at the local level, differentiated gender impacts, depletion of water and soil resources, biodiversity loss and many other.

The following summaries of research findings aim at raising awareness among government delegates about the social and environmental problems that the establishment of large-scale carbon sink plantations would result in, so as to enable them to adopt informed decisions in this respect. All summaries are accompanied by the web page address where the full case studies are available.

- In the case of ECUADOR:

A research on FACE-PROFAFOR tree plantations show several impacts:
- Unspecified income for the use of community lands;
- Displacement of other productive activities;
- Introduction of pine plantations in primary ecosystems (Paramo), not in degraded soils, as FACE-PROFAFOR alleges;
- Impacts on the Paramo, that are fundamental for the hydrological regulation of the region;
- Pine tree plantations are prone to catch fire;
- Trees show a deficient growth;
- Deficient capacity to provide adequate support to the communities.
• Carbon sink plantations in the Ecuadorian Andes. Impacts of the Dutch FACE-PROFAFOR monoculture tree plantations’ project on indigenous and peasant communities.
See: http://wrm.org.uy/countries/Ecuador/face.html

Another research shows the “development” model that ECUADOR has attempted to implement is destroying its natural ecosystems through the introduction of large-scale tree plantations.
The registered impacts are:
- Loss of biodiversity;
- Water shortages;
- Displacement of the campesinos who do not manage to find a work in the area;
- Migration of population to the slums of the large cities;
- Campesinos are pushed to sell their lands;
- Impoverishment of the population;
- Campesinos can’t produce what their families need to survive.
• Monoculture tree plantations in Ecuador. See: http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Ecuador/book2.pdf

- In the case of BRAZIL:

The tree plantations of Aracruz Celulose in the last 20 years, led to:
- The discharge of thousands of workers, due to mechanization and outsourcing;
- A growing precariousness of work conditions;
- The fragility of unions;
- Worrying situation of those that apply pesticides;
- Destruction of other work opportunities;
- Destruction of different traditional activities of the indigenous communities;
- Women’s loss of their place in the community;
- Forced women migration, and exchange of their rural activities for those of maids.
• Eucalyptus plantations and pulp production. Promises of job and destruction of work. The case of Aracruz Celulose in Brazil. See: http://wrm.org.uy/countries/Brazil/fase.html

- In the case of CHILE:

Monoculture tree plantation expansion in the Commune of Lumaco have had the following economic, social and environmental impacts:
- Indicators highlight Lumaco as a commune excluded from economic growth, public freedom, equal opportunities, culture and technological development;
- The local population receives the negative impacts of the model on its productive economy systems, its environment, physical and mental health and its culture;
- The forestry model has caused the disorganization, dissolution and weakening of the local economic, environmental and cultural systems;
- Exclusion from benefits and economic damages are two of the main causes of the pauperization of the economic situation of rural population;
- The explosive expansion of areas planted with pine and eucalyptus trees is associated with processes of serious environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity, reduction and contamination of surface and groundwater sources, etc.
• The economic and social context of monoculture tree plantations in Chile. The case of the Commune of Lumaco, Araucania Region. See: http://wrm.org.uy/publications/BookLumaco.html

- In the case of CAMBODIA:

A significant majority of the rural population – 85 per cent of Cambodia’s population – are subsistence farmers who depend on farmland, rivers and forests for their livelihoods.

In this context, monoculture tree plantations have severe impacts:
- Create limited number of jobs – particularly in light of what local people stand to lose if areas are cleared and plantations established;
- Workers are required to pay recruiters a fee for the jobs;
- Workers have to pay their own transportation to the concession area;
- Companies hire logging sub-contractors from other regions, against what the governor had specifically stipulated that the company should employ local inhabitants as a priority;
- Tree plantations companies ignore legal previsions;
- Causes environmental devastation in the plantation areas;
- Impunity and corruption characterizes the relationship between de Cambodian government and the companies;
- Large-scale exploitation of Cambodia’s resources for quick profits;
- disappearance of some species and dwindling numbers of others;
- Violation of human rights such as acts of intimidation, in particular against community representatives, and
prohibition to attend the community traditional ceremonies.
• A report on Wuzhishan’s and Green Rich’s tree plantations. The death of the forest.
See: http://wrm.org.uy/countries/Cambodia/bookCambodia.html

- In the case of URUGUAY:

In environmental, social and economic terms, monoculture tree plantations have serious impacts on:
- Surface and underground water;
- The country’s main ecosystem: grasslands;
- Destruction of the area’s unique landscape of low, flat-topped hills;
- Other rural economic activities such as agriculture, sheep farming and honey production;
- Local fauna such as proliferation of poisonous snakes, wild boars and foxes;
- Land concentration and ownership in corporate and foreign hands;
- Employment: precarious conditions and lost of permanent jobs;
- Depopulation of rural areas.
The companies that own the plantations have received a wide range of direct and indirect state support and externalization of environmental and social impacts has been essential for making viable an activity that would have been unviable without it.
• Greenwash.Critical analysis of FSC certification of industrial tree monocultures in Uruguay.
See: http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Uruguay/book.html

- In the case of SOUTH AFRICA:

This study has established that the lives and standards of living of local communities have not been improved by the monoculture tree plantation industry. The registered impacts are:
- Destruction of the natural environments, principally grasslands, which is irreversible;
- Invasion into natural areas by alien plants;
- Associated losses of indigenous taxa (plant and animal species);
- Irreversible change in present scenic values and possibly in environmental quality, and associated impacts on tourism;
- A reduction in streamflow and water quality;
- Increase safety and security concerns.
• A Study of the Social and Economic Impacts of Industrial Tree Plantations in the KwaZulu-Natal Province of South Africa. See: http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/SouthAfrica/book.html