Sarawak’s rush to trade forest carbon “will not help address climate change, and worse, it can also backfire with serious negative impacts” says Sahabat Alam Malaysia

By Chris Lang

In May 2022, Sarawak’s State Legislative Assembly passed amendments to the state’s Land Code and Forests Bill. The amendments include proposals for trading the carbon stored in Sarawak’s forests. Sarawak’s Premier, Abang Johari Openg, is enthusiastic about cashing in on carbon trading:

Carbon market is another solution to reduce carbon emissions. A well-designed and well-connected market, particularly the carbon market, can prove that Sarawak can grow its economy and protect the environment at the same time.

“I am determined to establish such markets that support cooperation, with consistent and robust rules underpinned by environmental integrity in line with sustainable development objectives for Sarawak.

But in a response to the new legislation Meenakshi Raman, president of Sahabat Alam Malaysia, wrote that,

The rush for “forest carbon credits” will not help address climate change, and worse, it can also backfire with serious negative impacts.

Raman argues that there are three main problems associated with the amendments to the Land Code and Forests Bill:

• “First, it will not help address climate change when forest carbon credits are being sold in the carbon market and are purchased by big polluters to offset their continued emissions.” CO₂ stays in the atmosphere for hundreds or thousands of years. To address the climate crisis we have to stop putting CO₂ into the atmosphere. Carbon trading allows fossil fuel corporations to buy carbon offsets and while continuing to profit and pollute.
   
  Raman notes the fundamental between difference the fast carbon cycle in trees, plants, and soils and the slow carbon cycle of fossil fuels, which effectively store carbon permanently. This difference was also highlighted in a 2020 letter signed by 41 scientists. The letter was originally published in the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter under the headline “Misleading and false myths about carbon offsets”.
   
  
• “Second, the amendments also reveal a way to allow for artificial carbon sequestration processes.” The amendments to the Land Code and the Forests Bill allow carbon capture and storage (CCS), which as Raman points out, “is another false climate solution”.
   
  CCS is hugely expensive, has not been developed beyond experimental stages, and it prolongs the use of fossil fuels. Pipelines used to transport CO₂ may damage landscapes and environmentally and culturally sensitive areas. There is a risk of leaks of CO₂ either from pipelines, or from storage reservoirs. And there is the risk that CCS projects can trigger earthquakes.
• “Lastly, there have been countless case studies and examples of how the carbon market will backfire, especially when it comes to the forest carbon credits which involve Native Customary Lands and the implications this has on the rights of indigenous peoples to their lands and forests.”
   
  Raman notes that there is a long history of encroachments on native customary territories, driven by logging operations and industrial tree plantations. The root cause of the violations of Native Customary Rights, Raman writes, “is systemic governance and legal issues, as a result of the absence of land tenure security”. The amendments to the Land Code and Forests Bill threaten to further exacerbate Native Customary Rights violations in Sarawak.
   
  Large-scale tree plantations for carbon offsets can displace farmers and Indigenous People – marginalised people who are least responsible for the climate crisis.

  Raman mentions Sabah’s controversial Nature Conservation Agreement as an example of what can happen when a state rushes into a carbon deal.

  

  Malaysia has produced a REDD Plus Finance Framework that commits, to some extent, to safeguard the rights of of Indigenous Peoples and local communities. But as Raman points out, “most case studies in other countries reveal the challenges in proper implementation of FPIC [free, prior and informed consent] to ensure meaningful local decision making and participation”.

Raman concludes that as a developing country Malaysia is entitled to receive financial resources to meet its climate commitments. She points out that strengthening the rights of Indigenous Peoples and the use of their traditional knowledge is vital to preserving forests and biodiversity, and in fighting climate change.

“We need real and sound solutions,” Raman writes, “not false, untested, expensive and controversial solutions that do not address the climate emergency that we are now facing.”
 

---

PHOTO Credit: Logging by Samling in the Long Moh community. The Borneo Project.