CARBON SOURCE AND CARBON SINK

Forests and climate change are intimately related, with forests serving both as a source of Carbon, and as a Carbon Sink. Forest store enormous amounts of carbon, thus the Carbon contained in forests is more than that in the atmosphere. Deforestation alone accounts for 35% of Carbon emissions in developing countries and a very sizable 65% of Carbon emission in the least developed countries (IPCC, 2007).

Brundtland (2009), estimates that halving deforestation could result in a net global economic gain of 3.7 trillion USD annually by the year 2010, and this makes it one of the most cost effective Climate Change mitigation measures available. It indicates that the total cost of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius can be reduced by 50 percent if forest related emissions are included in the global climate regime.

References

Brundtlhand, G. H (2009) Sustainable Forest Management and Climate Change: Key note address by special envoy for the Secretary- General of the United Nations on Climate Change. FAO Committee on Forestry – Rome, 17 March 2009.

IPCC (2007). Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the International Panel on Climate change. Core Writing Team, Pachavri, R. K and Reisinger, A. (Eds) IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland.