Category Archives: Forests

by | 2013-07-18 · 16:30

BREAKING: Chiapas cancels ‘disastrous’ forest carbon offset plan linked with Calif. cap-and-trade

Note: Global Justice Ecology Project broke the story about the California-Chiapas-Acre REDD Deal and the impacts it would have on the Indigenous populations of the Lacandon jungle in Chiapas, Mexico following a trip taken by then-GJEP Media Coordinator Jeff Conant (quoted below) and GJEP Board Chair and co-founder Orin Langelle to the Indigenous village Amador Hernandez, deep in the heart of the Lacandon jungle in March of 2011.

GJEP, along with Friends of the Earth, Indigenous Environmental Network and others have continued to monitor the situation in Chiapas, as well as to actively oppose the inclusion of REDD in the California cap-and-trade program, and to fight against REDD at the UN climate conferences.  While it is surely great news that Chiapas has decided to suspend the disastrous REDD program, we know that the fight is far from over.

To view the photo essay from GJEP’s 2011 trip to Chiapas, click here.  To view the 28 minute film we produced on the topic, click here.

-The GJEP Team

July 18, 2013. Source: Friends of the Earth-U.S.

Image: IEN

Image: IEN

The state government of Chiapas has cancelled a controversial forest protection plan that critics said failed to address the root causes of deforestation and could endanger the lives and livelihoods of indigenous peoples. The program is linked to California’s cap-and-trade program through a complex “carbon offset” scheme that has yet to see the light of day.

Carlos Morales Vázquez, the Mexican state’s secretary of the environment, on July 8 told the Chiapas daily El Heraldo that the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation program “was an utter failure, and the program is cancelled.”

What the suspension of the program means for California’s agreement with Chiapas remains to be seen. The program, instituted in 2011 after Chiapas signed an agreement with California as part of California’s Global Warming Solutions Act, AB32, has been widely criticized by civil society groups for its lack of clear objectives, absence of baseline measures of deforestation, and failure to engage indigenous people’s organizations or take into account historic tension over land rights that plague the region.
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Filed under Chiapas, Climate Change, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Latin America-Caribbean, REDD

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by | 2013-06-12 · 09:23

KPFK Earth Minute: Major protests against genetically engineered trees at biotech industry conference

kpfk_logoGlobal Justice Ecology Project teams up with the Sojourner Truth show on KPFK Pacifica Los Angeles for a weekly Earth Minute each Tuesday and a weekly Earth Watch interview each Thursday.

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Filed under Actions / Protest, Earth Radio, Forests, GE Trees, Genetic Engineering

by | 2013-06-03 · 09:25

Alternatives to failed forest carbon offset schemes promoted at climate talks

Note: Global Justice Ecology Project is the North American focal point for Global Forest Coalition.

-The GJEP Team

June 3, 2013. Source: Global Forest Coalition

As another round of climate talks opens today in Bonn, Germany, a coalition of human rights and forest groups have launched a manual for communities on alternatives to REDD+ and other forms of ‘green land grabbing’.

The manual, which has been produced by the Global Forest Coalition, Critical Information Collective, Biofuelwatch, the ICCA Consortium and EcoNexus highlights the risks of REDD+ projects and large-scale bioenergy production schemes for communities.  Many of these schemes have been associated with involuntary displacements of communities and other forms of so-called ‘green land grabbing’.

“REDD+ was promoted with the fairy tale that it would generate up to 30 billion USD per year in payments to countries and communities who conserve forests, but the voluntary forest carbon offset market has provided less than 1 percent of that amount  and public funding is declining” cautions Simone Lovera, executive director of the Global Forest Coalition, who will attend the upcoming talks.  “So Indigenous Peoples and local communities risk being cheated into contracts that take away their rights to control their own lands and territories in exchange for very uncertain financial rewards.” Negotiations about REDD+ funding stalled at the climate talks in December 2012.

Demand for biomass (for biofuels and for manufacturing in proposed new ‘bioeconomies’) is already increasing rapidly, and is likely to lead to yet more landgrabbing and industrial logging in forests.
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Filed under Bioenergy / Agrofuels, Carbon Trading, Climate Change, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, REDD, UNFCCC

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by | 2013-05-30 · 23:17

Photo Essay: Three brutally arrested protesting GE trees at industry conference

30 May, 2013

All photographs by Orin Langelle/ photolangelle.org for GJEP

_10m30_DSCN1302 Police use pain compliance holds as they wrestle a protester to the ground.  Activists were attempting to wrap a bus departing from the industry conference in GMO caution tape.

_7m30_DSCN1319 A local organizer with Katuah Earth First! is thrown to the ground and arrested in front of the bus.


_1m30_DSCN1380 Will Bennington, an organizer with Global Justice Ecology Project and the Campaign to STOP GE Trees prior to being thrown into an Asheville Police paddy wagon.


_12m30_DSCN1246 “You Spoil Our Forests – We Spoil Your Dinner” banner refers to blocking conference participants from attending an exclusive dinner at the Biltmore Estate – birthplace to industrial forestry in the US.


_11m30_DSCN1251 Tree Engineer and industry mouthpiece Steve Strauss takes photos of the protesters as they chant at him.  A security guard laughs.


_13m30_DSCN1335 Local Katuah EF! zombie organizer.


_9m30_DSCN1311 Police brutally pull and yank on peaceful activists


_8m30_DSCN1318 Police wrestle and throw to the ground a local woman organizer.


_6m30_DSCN1358


_5m30_DSCN1359


_4m30_DSCN1363 Zombie “Franken-tree” demonstrators bang on pots and pans and chant anti-GE tree slogan as arrests continue.


_3m30_DSCN1371 Protesters vow that resistance will continue.


_2m30_DSCN1378

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Filed under Actions / Protest, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Corporate Globalization, Energy, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, GE Trees, Green Economy, Greenwashing

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by | · 10:15

Hundreds protest genetically engineered eucalyptus trees in North Carolina

Note: News is spreading around the world about the largest protests ever against the genetically engineered tree industry.  Global Justice Ecology Project would like to thank everyone who has participated in or supported this week of action.  Stay tuned to Climate Connections for more updates.  The fun is not over yet.

-The GJEP Team

By Mike Ludwig, May 29, 2013.  Source: Truthout

Protests are raging outside of a biotechnology conference in Asheville, North Carolina, where demonstrators are voicing opposition to proposals to grow genetically engineered eucalyptus trees across the southeastern United States.

Hundreds of demonstrators marched outside the Tree Biotechnology 2013 conference on Wednesday, and organizers said the protest was the largest against genetically engineered trees yet. On Tuesday, two Asheville residents were arrested after disrupting a presentation at the conference, according to a release from activist groups.

The protests come just days after an estimated 2 million people joined protests against biotech giant Monsanto in countries across the world.

Two major sponsors of the biotechnology conference in Asheville, FuturaGene andArborGen, have proposed to introduce genetically engineered eucalyptus trees for commercial cultivation in the United States and Brazil. The trees would be burned as a source of biomass energy.
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Filed under Actions / Protest, Bioenergy / Agrofuels, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, GE Trees, Genetic Engineering

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by | 2013-05-29 · 14:27

Photo Essay: Hundreds descend upon Tree Biotech conference, demand ban on GE trees

By Will Bennington, May 28, 2013. Photos by Orin Langelle and Will Bennington.  Source: Global Justice Ecology Project

Just a day after two Asheville, NC residents were arrested for interrupting a talk at the Tree Biotechnology 2013 Conference, hundreds of demonstrators descended upon the conference center, throwing the biggest industry event of the year into utter chaos.

The demonstration – the world’s largest ever against GE trees – lasted four hours, and included speakers, singing, chanting and street theatre.

As part of a international movement against extreme energy extraction, demonstrators included members of Earth First!, Tar Sands Blockade, Mountain Justice and anti-mountaintop removal activists.  Local farmers, grandparents, children and students also participated.

Photo: Langelle/photolangelle.org for GJEP

GJEP Executive Director Anne Petermann addresses a crowd of over 200 on the dangers of GE trees. Photo: Langelle/photolangelle.org for GJEP

The demonstration is a major milestone in the international Campaign to STOP GE Trees.  The USDA is currently considering an application from GE tree company ArborGen to deregulate cold-tolerant GE eucalyptus in seven states in the southeastern US.  Industry and activists alike recognize that massive public opposition is a major threat, influencing the USDA’s decision as well as the willingness of investors to sink cash into a highly controversial sector.
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Filed under Actions / Protest, Bioenergy / Agrofuels, Climate Change, Ending the Era of Extreme Energy, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, GE Trees, Genetic Engineering

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by | 2013-05-23 · 09:00

Debate: Should California cap and trade use forestry offsets?

Note: Jeff Conant is a good friend and former Communications Director at Global Justice Ecology Project.  Global Justice Ecology Project has been tracking the California-Acre-Chiapas REDD deal since it was unveiled at the UN climate negotiations in Cancun, Mexico in 2010.

In 2011, GJEP’s Co-Director/Strategist Orin Langelle and Communications Director Jeff Conant travelled to Chiapas, Mexico to the Village of Amador Hernandez, an Indigenous village in the Lacandon Jungle of Chiapas threatened with relocation due to the REDD project.  Langelle took hundreds of photos in the community and the region which were assembled into a poignant photo essay.  And GJEP’s work in Chiapas broke the story of and documented the emerging impacts of REDD.  In 2012, GJEP released a short documentary from the trip, A Darker Shade of Green: REDD Alert and the Future of Forests, highlighting the California REDD deal.

-The GJEP Team

By Chris Lang, May 21, 2013. Source: REDD-Monitor

2013-05-21-152400_252x244_scrotThe debate about whether California should allow REDD carbon offsets in its cap and trade scheme (AB 32) continues. Over the weekend, theSacramento Bee published two opinion pieces, one opposing REDD credits and one in favour.

Jeff Conant, International Forests Campaigner for Friends of the Earth, argues against REDD credits. In favour of REDD are Dan Nepstad, director and president of the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), and Tony Brunello, the executive director of the Green Technology Leadership Group, partner at California Strategies and former California deputy secretary for climate change and energy.

So far, the discussion in the comments on the Sacramento Bee website following these two articles is dominated by climate sceptics. What follows is a summary of the arguments in the hope of generating a more sensible discussion (either here or on the Sacramento Bee website).

Conant argues that AB 32 is “one of the most forward-thinking pieces of climate legislation in the country”, but one that is already undermined by the inclusion of carbon offsets. It would only be undermined further by the inclusion of REDD credits from a “dubious and untried scheme to protect rain forests in Mexico and Brazil”. Continue reading →

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Filed under Carbon Trading, Chiapas, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Corporate Globalization, Ending the Era of Extreme Energy, Energy, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, Green Economy, Indigenous Peoples, Latin America-Caribbean, REDD

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by | 2013-05-08 · 10:00

Environmental and human rights organizations call on California to reject REDD forest offset credits

Note: Global Justice Ecology Project has been tracking the California-Acre-Chiapas REDD deal since it was unveiled at the UN climate negotiations in Cancun, Mexico in 2010.  In 2011, GJEP’s Co-Director/Strategist Orin Langelle and Communications Director Jeff Conant travelled to Chiapas, Mexico to the Village of Amador Hernandez, an Indigenous village in the Lacandon Jungle of Chiapas threatened with relocation due to the REDD project.  Langelle took hundreds of photos in the community and the region which were assembled into a poignant photo essay.  And GJEP’s work in Chiapas broke the story of and documented the emerging impacts of REDD.  In 2012, GJEP released a short documentary from the trip, A Darker Shade of Green: REDD Alert and the Future of Forests, highlighting the California REDD deal.

-The GJEP Team

May 7, 2013. Source: Global Justice Ecology Project

Photo: Langelle/GJEP-GFC

Photo: Langelle/GJEP-GFC

We appreciate the opportunity to submit comments on the REDD Offsets Working Group “Recommendations to Conserve Tropical Rainforests, Protect Local Communities and Reduce State-Wide Greenhouse Gas Emissions” for the state of California. California’s Global Warming Solutions Act, AB32, and the goals of reducing emissions from deforestation of remaining tropical rainforests are important and admirable efforts. However, in order to achieve the goals of AB32 and reducing deforestation we believe that allowing jurisdictional REDD offset credits to meet California’s emissions reduction targets will not be effective. REDD credits threaten to diminish the results of AB32 in California and the efforts of partner jurisdictions, including Chiapas and Acre, to protect their forests. Using subnational REDD initiatives, financed through offsets, to meet the targets of AB32 will be inefficient, ineffective, and create unintended consequences. Continue reading →

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Filed under Carbon Trading, Climate Change, Climate Justice, Corporate Globalization, Ending the Era of Extreme Energy, False Solutions to Climate Change, Forests, Green Economy, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabs, Latin America-Caribbean, REDD

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