Biodiversity

Delegates from 69 countries met Tuesday in Nagoya, central Japan, on the sidelines of the ongoing U.N. biodiversity talks to discuss ways to help developing nations tackle issues of deforestation in a bid to counter greenhouse gas emissions.

The economic importance of the natural assets of the world is now firmly on the political radar as a result of an international assessment showcasing the enormous economic value of forests, freshwater, soils and coral reefs, as well as the social and economic costs of their loss, was the conclusion of The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) report launched (20 October 2010) by TEEB study leader, Pavan Sukhdev, at the 10th Conference of Parties meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP10) in Nagoya.

Protection of forests for their carbon value through Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) schemes has been increasing in recent years. These schemes concentrate on preserving forest cover, and thus have great potential for the conservation of natural biodiversity. Some (REDD+) initiatives already specifically take biodiversity protection into account.

GRANTS PASS, Ore. – A federal appeals court Friday cleared the way for logging to resume in an old growth forest reserve at a national forest in Oregon to protect northern spotted owl habitat from being lost to wildfire.

22 July 2010  | In the March edition of SinergiA, a quarterly newsletter on environmental services in Latin America, Jacob Olander, Director of The Katoomba Ecosystem Services Incubator (a project of Ecosystem Marketplace publisher Forest Trends), takes a long, hard look at the future of REDD projects.