Precarious Participation: Assessing Inequality and Risk in the Carbon Credit Commodity Chain

Abstract

In this article, I examine the limitations of payment for ecosystem services (PES) carbon forestry programs in their ability to alleviate rural poverty and mitigate global climate change within the market context in which they operate. Turning to the Scolel’te program in Mexico’s southernmost state, Chiapas, I illustrate how, in 2008, international buyers of carbon credits produced in the region began to alter their sourcing decisions in response to shifting dynamics within the global economy—what I refer to here as market risk. I then use a commodity chains framework to (1) reveal how program managers in Scolel’te sought to protect the program in the face of such risk by using their relative positions of power to govern how carbon credit producing farmers operated and (2) illustrate the implications of this market risk and the decisions of program managers for farmers participating in the program. I find that the governance decisions made by program managers in the face of market risk led to a series of unintended outcomes that included the dissolution of the social relations of production between program managers and carbon credit–producing farmers as well as the social relations within participating communities. As a result, farmers began to leave the program, abandoning their agroforestry plantings and limiting the full realization of the program’s positive environmental and social outcomes in the region. Key Words: carbon forestry, carbon market, commodity chain, Mexico, risk.

我于本文中检视生态系统服务（PES）碳森林计画的付费, 在其所施行的市场脉络中, 减轻乡村贫穷与缓和全球气候变迁的能力限制。我转向墨西哥最南方的恰帕斯州中推行的斯科莱特（Scolel’te）计画, 阐述在该区域所生产的碳信用的国际买家, 为何开始转变其源头的决策, 以回应全球经济中的转变动态——我于此称之为市场风险。我接着运用商品鍊的架构来（1）揭露斯科莱特的计画经理人在面临此般风险时, 如何运用其相对的权力位置来管理生产碳信用的农夫如何运作, 以寻求保护该计画；以及（2）阐述此般市场风险以及计画经理人的决策对参与至该计画的农民之意涵。我发现计画经理人在面临市场风险时的治理决策, 导致一系列非计画中的结果, 包含计画经理人和生产碳信用的农民之间的社会生产关系、以及参与该计画的社群中的社会关系的瓦解。农民因而开始背离该计画, 放弃他们的农业森林种植, 并限制了该计画在该区的正面环境与社会结果的全面实现。关键词: 碳森林, 碳市场, 商品鍊, 墨西哥, 风险。

En este artículo, examino las limitaciones de los programas de pago por servicios ecosistémicos (PES) de carbono forestal, en lo que se refiere a su capacidad de aliviar la pobreza rural y mitigar el cambio climático global dentro del contexto del mercado dentro del cual operan. Volviendo al programa de Scolel’te en Chiapas, el estado más meridional de México, ilustro cómo, en 2008, los compradores internacionales de créditos de carbono producidos en la región empezaron a alterar sus decisiones sobre fuentes en respuesta a la dinámica cambiante dentro de la economía global––a lo que yo me refiero aquí como riesgo de mercado. Uso luego un marco de cadenas de mercaderías para (1) revelar el modo como los administradores del programa en Scolel’te buscaron proteger el programa frente a tal riesgo usando sus posiciones relativas de poder para dictaminar el modo de operar de los agricultores productores de créditos de carbono; y para (2) ilustrar las implicaciones de este riesgo de mercado y las decisiones de los administradores frente a los agricultores que participaran en el programa. Encuentro que las decisiones de gobernanza tomadas por los administradores de programa frente al riesgo del mercado llevaron a una serie de resultados inesperados que incluyeron la disolución de las relaciones sociales de producción entre los administradores de programa y los agricultores generadores de créditos de carbono, lo mismo que las relaciones sociales dentro de las comunidades participantes. El resultado fue que los agricultores empezaron a salirse del programa, abandonando sus plantíos agroforestales y limitando la cabal realización de los resultados ambientales y sociales positivos del programa para la región.

Palabras clave:

• carbono forestal
• cadena de mercaderías
• mercado del carbono
• México
• riesgo

Notes

1 In 1990, for instance, Chiapas, with only 3 percent of Mexico’s population, accounted for the production of 54 percent of the country’s hydroelectric power and over 10 percent of its corn production (Collier and Quaratiello 1999).

2 Over the counter (OTC) refers to those transactions realized outside of a formal exchange. Although AMBIO has attempted to facilitate the trading of carbon credits to individuals via their Web site, the overwhelming majority of carbon credit sales are to wholesalers via OTC markets given AMBIO’s limited organizational resources required to locate and establish relationships with diverse individual buyers such as government offices or small corporations.

3 Peters-Stanley and Yin (2013) also noted that CSR-inspired buyers are accompanied in voluntary markets by precompliance buyers who participate either to (a) buy carbon offsets that can be stored for a perceived future compliance need or (b) sell at a higher price to organizations that might face a future compliance requirement.

4 Hawkins et al. (2010) noted that when buyers acquire carbon offsets through forward purchase agreements, they are often assuming a certain degree of risk tied to the production process, including, for instance, the risk that due to factors such as fire, or even unpredictable social or political factors, the carbon credit might not, in the end, be produced. For producers of carbon credits and managers of carbon forestry programs, this method of forward purchases provides a means of sharing the risk burden tied to production activities. Hawkins et al. (2010) noted, however, that buyers are often compensated for taking on this risk in the form of having to pay less for the carbon credits they acquire.

5 Each community participating in the Scolel’te program elects one community extension agent—referred to as técnicos comunitarios—to represent their community to the managing NGO. Additionally, each region where the program is present has a regional extension agent—referred to as técnicos regionales.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jonathan Otto

JONATHAN OTTO is a Lecturer in Arts Studies in Research and Writing (ASRW) in the Faculty of Arts at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4, Canada. E-mail: [email protected]. His research interests include environmental justice, development, and climate change adaptation and mitigation in southern Mexico.