REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
REDD in the Democratic Republic of Congo fails to uphold indigenous peoples’ rights and is fuelling land conflicts
The province of Mai Ndombe in the Democratic Republic of Congo has about 10 million hectares of forest. Of the population of 1.8 million living in Mai Ndombe, about 73,000 are indigenous people.
REDD in the news: 12-18 March 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
Jesse Ribot on REDD: “It is time to be angry about the abuses of rural communities”
Jesse Ribot is a Professor of Geography at the University of Illinois. In December 2017, Ribot wrote the foreword to a new book, “Global Forest Governance and Climate Change” edited by Emmanuel O. Nuesiri. Ribot’s contribution to the book is a blistering critique of REDD.
Philippine government labels human rights defenders “terrorists”
On 21 February 2018, the Philippines State Prosecutor of the Department of Justice filed a petition in a Manila court to declare the Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People’s Army as terrorist organisations. The petition includes the names of more than 600 people, who the government claims are communist guerrillas.
REDD in the news: 5-11 March 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
Environmental organisations call on Democratic Republic of Congo not to open up its rainforest to loggers
Last week, José Ilanga the Director General in charge of forests at the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development in the Democratic Republic of Congo, announced that plans were underway to lift the country’s 16-year-old moratorium on new logging concessions. Today, more than 50 environmental and human rights organisations have written to key donor governments and agencies, including Norway, UK, France, USA, and the World Bank, calling on them to suspend funding immediately to the DRC government for forestry and forest conservation.
Brazil’s Federal Supreme Court has ruled against protecting the environment – including the Amazon rainforest
On 28 February 2018, Brazil’s Federal Supreme Court upheld the 2012 Forest Code as constitutional, including the Forest Code’s amnesty for landowners that illegally cleared forest before 22 July 2008.
REDD in the news: 26 February – 4 March 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo has abandoned any pretence of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation
On 1 February 2018, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s forests were dealt a double blow. First, DRC’s Minister of Environment, Amy Ambatobe, reinstated three illegal logging concessions covering an area of 6,500 square kilometres. Second, DRC’s president, Joseph Kabila, signed off on three oil exploration concessions covering a huge area of Mai Ndombe province, including part of the Salonga National Park.
REDD in the news: 19-25 February 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
Legal expert on communities in the Oddar Meanchey REDD project in Cambodia: “REDD+ is done to them”
David Takacs is an Associate Professor at the University of California Hastings College of the Law. In December 2012, he carried out a pro bono legal consulting trip to Vietnam and Cambodia for “an international NGO that was planning REDD+ projects in Southeast Asia.” One of the REDD projects that Takacs looked at was the Oddar Meanchey REDD project in Cambodia.
REDD in the news: 12-18 February 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.
Threats of eviction against indigenous Sengwer people continue in Kenya
The Sengwer indigenous people who live in the Embobut forest in the western highlands of Kenya continue to face threats of violence and evictions. The latest round of violent evictions started at the end of December 2017. The evictions, carried out by the Kenya Forest Service, are supposedly in the name of “conservation”.
REDD in the news: 5-11 February 2018
REDD-Monitor’s round-up of the week’s news on forests, climate change, and REDD. For regular updates, follow @reddmonitor on Twitter.