Avoided Deforestation: How Costly? How Powerful a Tool?

Abstract

Tropical deforestation has been a major environmental issue for decades, yet the main focus of the rationale for forest protection has been shifted over time. Recently, in the light of climate change, forests are attracting attention for its function of carbon sequestration and storing. In order to slow down the accelerating emission of carbon arising from deforestation in the carbon-rich tropical forests, the concept of reduced emissions from destruction and degradation (REDD) has emerged. This article reviews a number of earlier and recent efforts to estimate value of forests and costs of mitigating those deforestation, which is central to the ongoing discussion of REDD.

Keywords:

• biodiversity
• carbon sequestration
• climate change mitigation
• deforestation
• global warming
• tropical forests