Contribution of Forest Management Credits in Kyoto Protocol Compliance and Future Perspectives

Article 3 paragraph 3 and paragraph 4 of the Kyoto Protocol (KP) allow parties to use credits from land-based activities for offsetting their emission reduction/limitation target committed in the KP. Forest management (FM) is the dominant activity accounted by Annex I parties of the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change in the first commitment period of KP (2008–2012). Data reported for 2008 and 2009 indicate that over half of the emission reduction target of 24 Annex I parties that expect to use FM removals can be offset by FM credits in the first commitment period. Especially the majority of the emission reduction target of Slovenia, Sweden, Latvia, Finland, Japan, and Croatia may be achieved through FM credits. The total FM CAP as contained in decision 16/CMP.1 in the first commitment period was over-estimated significantly by 50% for all KP parties and 36% for parties that elected FM. Some parties such as Russia, Japan, Italy, Germany, and Switzerland that elected FM activity may benefit largely from the over-estimated CAP. Presuming a significant increase of the harvest rate, the FM reference level (FMRL) for 2013–2020 is only 1/5 of the historical mean value of FM removals even though most parties show an increasing or a steady trend of net removals from 1990 to 2009. As a result Annex I parties would be able to use FM credits in the future that are over 4 times of FM CAP in the first commitment period. This potential FM credit would account for 7.7% of total emissions by sources without land use, land-use change and forestry activities (LULUCF) in the base year or 1990, and more Annex I parties would share the “benefit” from the FMRL accounting approach.CitationZhang, X., 2011: Contribution of forest management credits in Kyoto Protocol compliance and future perspectives. Adv. Clim. Change Res.,2(4), doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1248.2011.00171.