RI asked to draw up national strategy for UN-REDD

Antara News, Tuesday, November 24, 2009 13:42 WIB

Jakarta (ANTARA News) - As a tropical-forested country, Indonesia has been asked by the United Nations to draw up a national strategy to reduce emissions from deforestation.

Indonesia and other countries with tropical rain forests are stepping up the fight to combat climate change by taking new initiatives called the UN Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (UN-REDD) program.

Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hassan at a national discussion on climate change here on Monday signed a document on government participation in the UN collaboration program in the UN-REDD program.

The UN-REDD program, to be carried out in a collaboration with the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), was unveiled by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Prime Minister of Norway Jens Stoltenberg in New York last September.

The Indonesian province of Aceh, with its vast forests and willingness to work on REDD issues, will naturally be a focus of the UN-REDD.

In the national discussion, the UNDP Director for Indonesia, Hakan Bjorkman, said the program was intended to assist the developing countries to arrange a REDD scheme.

Norwegian Environment Minister Erik Solheim who was also present in the discussion said his government was financing the initial phase of the UN-REDD program in Indonesia and in other developing countries.

Indonesia and eight other developing countries namely Bolivia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Tanzania, Viet Nam, and Zambia have already expressed formal interest in assistance under the UN-REDD program.

The UN-REDD program will support these countries as part of an international move to include REDD in new and more comprehensive UN climate change arrangements to kick-in post 2012.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that the cutting down of forests is now contributing close to 20 per cent of the overall greenhouse gases entering the atmosphere.

The program is aimed at tipping the economic balance in favor of sustainable management of forests so that their formidable economic, environmental and social goods and services benefit countries, communities and forest users while also contributing to important reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Indonesian Environment Minister Muhammad Hatta said he would make coordination with related institutions to make the arrangement of emission reduction scheme from deforestation a success.

"UN-REDD is an inter-sectoral issue and therefore, with other related ministers we will make every effort to make the program a success," Muhammad Hatta said.