”Climate agreement should include reduced deforestation”

At a meeting in New York on 23 September, heads of state and government from all over the world underlined the need for an agreement to reduce deforestation in developing countries.

”Emissions from deforestation represent close to 20 per cent of the world’s total amount of greenhouse gas emissions. In order to halt climate changes, we must succeed in halting deforestation and forest degradation”, Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg says. 

With the UN Secretary General, the leader of the World Bank, the British Prime Minister, the US Secretary of State, the EU Presidency and leaders from a number of affected countries, Prime Minister Stoltenberg discussed the need to include reduced deforestation in a global climate agreement at the summit in Copenhagen in December.

Norway has allocated up to NOK 3 billion annually as a contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation in developing countries. Also, up to NOK 6 billion has been pledged to Brazil’s Amazon Fund in the years before 2015, provided Brazil delivers large and verifiable reductions in deforestation.

Norway holds the secretariat function of an informal working group of 30 donor countries and central countries affected by deforestation. The group works to find how reduced emissions from deforestation can be financed before a mechanism under the UN Framework Convention becomes operational.