Press release – 18 October, 2010Nagoya, Monday 25 October 2010: Today, at the Convention of Biological Diversity being held in Japan, Greenpeace released a report explaining why the Government of Papua New Guinea (PNG) is in no fit state to receive international funding for REDD – a global deal to stop deforestation and mitigate climate change.zoom
Papua New Guinea: Not ready for REDD
Greenpeace also presented the Government of PNG with a ‘Golden Chainsaw’ award for demanding unconditional, fast-track money to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) from the international community, even though it continues to destroy rainforests.
Sam Moko, Greenpeace Forests Campaigner from PNG who is in Nagoya to launch the report and announce the award, said:  “The Somare Government is hungry for international funding from REDD but has no plans to stop destroying its own rainforests or reduce its own emissions. Under the current direction of this Government, PNG is not ready for REDD. (1)
“How can the Government be expected to enforce a sophisticated REDD program, which requires thorough monitoring of emissions from reduced deforestation, when it cannot keep its own forest sector under control?”
“Decades of industrial logging have not delivered the promised benefits of employment, improved health and education. We urgently need an alternative to protect our forests and ensure our future.
“REDD offers real hope for PNG but instead of taking a leading role for the good of its people and its forests, the Government is only motivated by greed.”
At the last REDD meetings in China, PNG was criticised for manipulating the negotiations. With only weeks until the annual UN climate summit in Cancun, efforts to fast-track REDD funding could come to nothing if PNG continues to use its position as co-chair of the negotiations for its own ends.
The new report, ‘Papua New Guinea: Not ready for REDD’ recommends that PNG only receives REDD funding when it places a moratorium on all logging and deforestation. Donor countries should also ensure strict preconditions are placed on REDD funding for PNG including safeguards for biodiversity and indigenous and landowners rights and ending corruption and illegal logging.
Contact: Jessa Latona, Greenpeace in Sydney +61 488 208 465
Steve Smith, Greenpeace International communications, +81 90 1793 2767 (in Nagoya)
Notes: (1) Report available at:
http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/issues/deforestation/resources
(2) Due largely to unsustainable levels of logging, PNG has the second highest proportion of national greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the world. WRI -World Resources Institute (2008). Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) Version 5.0. Washington, DC: World Resources Institute (WRI).
http://cait.wri.org
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