| Original Message |
Anonymous (no login)
Posted Jun 12, 2009 7:41 PM
PNG carbon trade highly suspicious
June 12 2009 at 10:32 AM
No score for this post Anonymous
PNG carbon trade highly suspicious
PNG is playing a lead role in the United Nations programme reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD).
The logging industry describes REDD as an attempt to coax PNG into restricting logging in return for cash.
Even though a global emissions scheme has yet to be defined which makes measuring carbon credits impossible the Government insists that it will handle potential carbon trading deals on behalf of the resource owners.
The issue of carbon trading requires more clarification before any deals can proceed as it will cause enormous frictions between the Government and the landowners.
However, the director of the Climate Change and Environment Sustainability (OCCES), Dr Theo Yasause, claims ownership is not a sticking point and that the State has absolute control over the resources.
Once the landowners are signed up, it doesnt give the landowners the legitimacy, only the State has the legitimate authority.
The Government has failed in the forestry, oil and gas sectors.
There is no equitable distribution of benefits coming from these resource developments and, at this early point in time, when the office of climate change is not fully set up, I wonder how well Dr Yasause understands climate change and carbon trade.
At the moment, the Government does not have any policy framework for carbon trade and climate change in PNG.
Therefore, the concept of compensating developing countries for not cutting down their forests is proving difficult.
Furthermore, PNG also wants money for increasing its forest carbon stocks as well as avoiding deforestation.
This is what I have gathered thus far:
1. The OCCES has no legal and policy framework in place. Therefore, any commitments that it has made so far have no effect. All proclamations made by Dr Yasause have been made on the assumption of authority.
2. The position of director of OCCES was never advertised publicly. Dr Yasause was hand-picked by the Somare Government.
3. Doubts are still circulating whether Dr Yasause is qualified.
4. The office is working in isolation and does not attempt to utilise any services of prominent scientists in the country.
5. Newspapers report OCCES are going on a frenzy, scrambling for information on climate change all over the place. This is a clear indication of incompetent, inexperienced and unqualified personnel holding positions in the office.
6. Confusing public notices in the media by the office to divert public attention and create opportunities for middlemen to handle REDD funds and make it miserable for the real resource owners.
7. Two companies have been issued certificates to trade carbon credits to date. Why the hurry when there is no law and policy framework in place? A pertinent question is do they have forests themselves? You cannot be riding on other peoples forest resources.
8. The office does not reflect a true representation of the resource owners of PNG.
Kipali Kana
Edinburgh, Scotland |
|
|