 Hello everyone, welcome to the first session of the afternoon. I hope you've had a good time networking a way out there in this revolutionary new way that's been devised for you. What we have in the next 45 minutes is what it says here, a global update on forests and climate change. I'm Richard Black, I'm actually a BBC journalist by day, but I'm not here as a journalist, just trying to keep our four panellists in order for the next 45 minutes or so. And these really are going to be updates. We've asked our panellists to be brief as they can and to give you a quick snapshot of what's going on in their area so that you have time to ask them questions and put points to them afterwards. We're going to be hearing from Tony Lavinia right from the heart of the Red Plus negotiations. We're going to be hearing from Oediga on the latest on the Governor's Climate and Forest Task Force and from Rachel Kite of the World Bank who's promised to bring some agriculture into this forest setup, but let me without further ado introduce the first speaker Caroline Spellman, who's Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in the UK. Caroline. Well thank you very much Roger and good afternoon everybody. I'd like to join others today in paying tribute to the work of the Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangarai Mathai, who sadly died recently. I was very struck by an article she wrote shortly before her death in which she said governments must demonstrate a commitment to standing forests and the rehabilitation of degraded forests and this can only be done if laws that encourage continued deforestation and forest degradation are reformed and if communities are supported to plant appropriate trees. If none of this happens considerable financial resources will be invested without achieving reductions in poverty and other development gains. As the world can see in East Africa there is no time to waste and there is no time to waste. Global forests are vitally important and forests are crucial to the livelihoods of 1.2 billion of the world's poorest people including 60 million indigenous people who depend on these forests for survival. They play an important role in preserving biological biodiversity with 50 to 80 percent of terrestrial biodiversity located in them and deforestation is responsible for 17 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions so quite right we should be debating this in the context of COP 17. Forests are not only a source of greenhouse gas emissions but also part of the solution. Of course there are key issue within the climate change negotiations but they are also important for biodiversity protection, food security, water, energy and the ecosystem services that they provide but globally forests are under increasing pressure because of the demand for timber products and the conversion of forests into agricultural land for food production. These matters were analysed in the UK government's foresight report on global food and farming futures which was sponsored by my department jointly with the Department for International Development led by someone I'm sure known to you Professor Sir John Beddington. That report looked at how we can feed a growing global population and John Willis uses this statistic which I think is so powerful that there will be a billion more people in the world in 14 years time that really does focus the mind. It identified the big challenges and choices we face in seeking to balance competing pressures on the global food system. The report called for an integrated approach to food security with emphasis on promoting a more sustainable approach to agriculture. The international commission on sustainable agriculture and climate change has recently made similar recommendations. We need to raise agricultural yields but we need to raise them through improved productivity rather than through using more land or water. 70% of the water in use is currently for agriculture and the demand for food is forecast to increase by 50% by 2050. We also need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the negative effects which agriculture can have on our environment. In essence we need that climate smart agriculture we're talking about about now. This approach offers a route to a green low carbon resource efficient economy while increasing food production that's fundamental to poverty alleviation economic growth and environmental sustainability. Climate smart agriculture is not a panacea but it can help us address adaptation mitigation and food security. Agriculture will have to adapt to increasingly variable and unpredictable growing conditions including the increased incidence of floods and droughts increased temperatures and different patterns of weeds and pests and diseases. Another important part of this equation is access to water. Current estimates suggest that just over a billion people live in river basins facing physical water scarcity and a recent analysis suggests that three quarters of the global population is exposed to the threat of water insecurity. I've already mentioned global agriculture uses more than 70% of all water withdrawals but recent examples of the impact of that are too little water in the Horn of Africa or too much water on the impact of the floods in Pakistan last year. To national level integrated water resource management is essential to deal with these competing demands. Now all of these issues forests water food security sustainable land management and biodiversity are linked. It's therefore essential that we adopt an approach that takes proper account of their relationships between them. This highlights the importance of the natural capital of our forests the value we place on forests is much greater than the value of the timber products they provide. Forests offer so much more fuel food medicines soil fertility water cycle management cultural and spiritual values however as long as they remain undervalued forests will continue to be damaged and potential economic opportunities lost forever unless we can recognise their true value. International forestry is a high priority for my department and for the UK government that's why I'm here today. The UK through its international climate fund has committed £2.9 billion sterling to enable the UK to help developing countries both adapt to the impacts of climate change and move on to a low carbon growth path. Of this £2.9 billion £600 million is aimed at tackling deforestation forest degradation and the drivers of deforestation. The fund is jointly run by ministers from three government departments working together department of energy and climate change the department for international development and my own. Together we've agreed that under the fund we will be investing in red plus and forest governance to deliver climate change biodiversity and poverty alleviation. This joined up policy making is extremely important and ensures that we're able to achieve multiple benefits through our international forestry funding. Taking a joined up approach also means that we get the maximum value for the resources invested. As part of the international climate fund the three departments are developing a forests and climate change program we'll be working closely with forest nation partners donor countries and the private sector and other stakeholders to ensure the portfolio delivers results against our three main objectives carbon abatement biodiversity protection and poverty reduction. More particularly my department is working now closely with the brazilian government to develop a joint project in the sejado that's a section of dryland forest right adjacent to the amazon but less well known and I'm very pleased to announce that my department is going to fund a £10 million project in the sejado. Home to 5% of the planet's biodiversity in fact 30% of brazil's biodiversity the sejado is considered to be one of the most biodiverse savannas in the world yet deforestation is intense driven by agriculture and forest fires by 2009 the biome had already lost about 48% of its forest cover this project will reduce rates of deforestation by supporting the registration of land ownership under the rural environment register to ensure compliance with the brazilian forest code it will provide technical assistance to help farmers with a restoration of vegetation on illegally cleared land and it will support measures to prevent and deal with forest fires a major driver of deforestation the uk is complementing its work on deforestation and the drivers of deforestation with an expanded program of support for forest governance in forest nations it's essential that land tenure is clarified and regulatory legislation put in place and enforced to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in a credible and sustainable way the uk's forest governance markets and climate program combines demand side measures to change behaviour in consumer countries with supply side actions to strengthen governance capacity and legality systems in producer countries including a number of african countries durban needs to follow up on the cancun red plus agreement which sets the framework for country level efforts we need to make progress on the methodological guidance on how to implement red plus covering reference levels environmental and social safeguards and monitoring and reporting this morning i spoke in a session organised by the convention of biological diversity where i stressed the importance of promoting the synergies between biodiversity and climate change objectives particularly through biodiversity safeguards in red plus as well as ecosystem based approaches to adaptation we need to seize these opportunities for the multiple benefits from red plus and to avoid its potential adverse impacts by helping implement the safeguards agreed in cancun finally and perhaps most critically progress needs to be made on the financing of red plus this will require the green climate fund to include finance for red plus the use of all available sources of climate financing both public and private synergies with non-climate funding including payment for ecosystem services and delivering the results for local people and ecosystems as well as the global climate system it's also clear that red plus requires not only investment in forests but also investments to tackle the drivers of deforestation in particular we need to invest in environmental sustainable agriculture we also need to establish a UNFCCC work programme on agriculture that is able to consider both climate adaptation and mitigation this will enable parties to address these matters properly within the terms of convention but while UNFCCC attention to forests and agriculture is essential it's not the only forum that matters Rio plus 20 next year provides an excellent opportunity to complement work in the multilateral conventions and to catalyze new initiatives with governments the private sector and wider civil society for sustainable development in forests and agricultural land use i'm realistic about what can be achieved through these international processes i don't subscribe to the view that it's all too difficult these issues matter to people's livelihoods and future prosperity we need to summon political will to overcome them we have a real opportunity to make progress through Durban to Rio and on to Hyderabad moving to a low carbon economy producing more food sustainably dealing with environmental degradation providing access to clean energy and poverty eradication are all part of the same picture we simply won't be able to tackle these issues successfully if we try to deal with the various problems in isolation finally let me bring us right back to Avangari Matai who i quoted at the beginning of my speech because this is the international year of forests and we are here in Africa to address how to protect forests globally as she said governments must demonstrate a commitment to standing forests and the rehabilitation of degraded forests red plus is not only about the total area forest cover but also about protecting natural forests that are carbon rich climate resilient and provide the vital ecosystem services on which so many people depend and red plus is not only about forests but also about tackling the drivers of deforestation through sustainable land management and sustainable agriculture supported by improved land tenure and forest governance we face a huge global challenge on climate change poverty and biodiversity especially at a time of economic austerity we need to make every effort to count by seeking multiple benefits carbon biodiversity and poverty reduction i look forward to working closely with others on these issues here in Durban and also in the run-up to Rio plus 20 next year thank you very much well thank you Caroline Spalman um she was mentioning there are very obvious issues where agriculture and forests interact for good or evil and that's the thing that's going to the thing that's going to be picked up by our next speaker speaker Rachel Kites who's um in charge of sustainability at the world bank which means both environment and sustainable agriculture right thank you richard uh good afternoon everybody um yesterday i promised uh i'm sure some of you were there um those gathered for agriculture day that i would bring the outcomes and the results of their conversation into forest day um it was a very upbeat meeting i thought uh led uh by the honourable minister of agriculture forestry and fisheries for south africa tina dream of peterson who even called on god and whiskey to help us find a way to bring agriculture into climate negotiations i don't know how much whiskey you've got here but obviously you you guys had a lot of success over the years with red and so um we thought we'd uh we thought we needed a little bit of help too there was real steel and focus in the way in which she uh presented the challenge to an audience of about 500 600 researchers farmers development practitioners civil society groups policy makers and by the end of the day she got what she asked for what the south african government very much wanted which was a strong unequivocal call for action on climate smart agriculture she is now going to deliver a letter to the negotiators asking them to approve at a minimum a decision to set up a work program on agriculture under subster the letter poses an ultimatum of sorts um i think you have experience in the forest world of ultimatums without a work program for agriculture there shouldn't be a deal the simple sounding request is the culmination of years of years of thinking solid research a mounting sense of urgency that something needs to be done and fast to transform agriculture into a more productive sustainable and resilient system currently greenhouse gases from agriculture account for roughly 14 percent of global emissions we have no other choice if we are to rise the challenge of feeding nine billion people by 2050 without destroying the planet of doing something the horizon seems distant but the crisis in agriculture is felt on several counts today more frequent and extreme weather events are already affecting the food supply infrastructure and livelihoods you only have to think about the cycle of drought and forest fires in russia last year the tragedy unfolding this year in the horn of africa to appreciate the challenges facing our food system agriculture and rural development day was a showcase of proven solutions and innovation that address those challenges throughout the day i was impressed by the powerful evidence of climate smart agriculture delivering food and incomes adapting to existing climate variability and reducing greenhouse gas emissions as they were presented participants concluded that there is much to be done to scale up these examples in order to transfer food and farming systems in agriculture just as in forests we face the challenge of speed and scale the day ended on another high note picking up very much from where the minister left off power postage from brazil offered to host the next agriculture and rural development day at rio plus 20 i hope you would agree that that's another excellent opportunity to fuse the agendas together and i think that from my perspective respecting the proud history of forest days and all of the effort that many have put into developing this but also now looking at the momentum developing in the agriculture sector sector as we look at one landscape rio plus 20 really would be the place where we could try to find a way to discuss these items in tandem so why was i asked to talk about agriculture at forest day well because as you know the fate of forests and agriculture are bound together they're bound together just as food security poverty reduction and climate change can't be addressed in isolation so forests and mosaic landscapes climate change mitigation adaptation goals will not be reached without good sustainable development forests cannot be sustained if people are hungry or the governance of natural resources is inadequate issues of poverty food security and access to energy are inextricably linked and should be an integral part of how we respond to climate change when i talk to our clients countries that are borrowing or seeking our knowledge they ask for our deep sexual expertise in agriculture in energy in water in in forestry but they're also asking us to help them think through the nexus of those issues and also asking us to help them build systems whereby they can analyse the nexus at the same time hunger places a direct burden on forests when people are forced to push deeper into forested areas to grow crops hunger and poverty take a toll when people resort to making and selling charcoal faster than the natural rate of forestry regeneration in order to buy food you can try to ring face forests or try to ban charcoal but unless and until access to land crop productivity energy affordability and extreme poverty are addressed our best efforts will be in vain we have to propose viable integrated solutions that work for people on the ground unless they benefit from the protection of water sheds or increased crop yields or have higher income or can live with greater climate resilience the best laid carbon plans will fail this morning francis seymour tony simons and myself law had the pleasure of launching a new research programme on forestrys and agroforestry this consulted with group on agricultural research programme is a collaborative effort from a group of leading research institutions c4 the world agroforestry centre by vs biodiversity and the international centre for tropical agriculture it should help countries and development partners expand their focus from dense canopy tropical forests to mixed agricultural forest landscapes or mosaic landscapes where people and trees come into greater contact those landscapes as you heard this morning are under huge pressure growing population energy demand soil erosion nutrient depleting agricultural practices and increasingly climate change at the same time forests and trees in africa's drylands and other parts of the world are crucial safety nets for people struggling to avert famine in times of economic and climatic stress the value of that safety net is immense it would be terrible to watch it disappear only to realise the true value of the ecosystem in which we live in fact in 2011 we can't really claim ignorance there's been excellent work done by unip by us and others to put a price tag on ecosystem services the price is basically infinite we know forests and trees on farms are an integral part of the landscape systems that support us all and we need to find ways to value them the good news is that there's more and more willingness to focus on adaptation livelihoods food security and dry forests the agenda of forest day today attests to that and also attests to the greater awareness of the integrated solutions that are out there it's what we call the triple win mitigating climate change by building resilience in farming and forest systems while increasing yields and income farmers already understand that growing trees on farms can help fatten their livestock break the impact of harsh winds and improve soil conditions within a few years those trees can provide wood fuel for domestic use of a sale our job is to support policies nationally and internationally that encourage those kinds of practices based on best science and common sense so in my conclusion bringing yesterday to today i would urge you the experts and you those who advise policymakers to keep the needs of local people first and foremost in your minds and in global plans mitigation and adaptation initiatives particularly in forest and agriculture only succeed if they are pro-poor if we shore up sustainable access to natural resources and improve livelihoods we can lessen the toll of short sighted degradation pollution and deforestation we act now and if we act decisively we can perhaps reverse the vicious cycles and start investing in landscape restoration and poverty reduction programmes that deliver that triple win adaptation based mitigation is a solution to a landscape in which we can all live sustainably thank you thanks very much rachel well probably like me a lot of you spend time at these conferences looking at doors where people are talking and you wonder what's going on and there are so many of these doors that often you can't really get a good handle on exactly what is going on and all of these processes at the same time well we're about to be enlightened on one of the most important here let me introduce our next speaker tony lovinia who's uh dean of the atoneo school of government in atoneo de manila university in the philippines he led the uh lulu cf negotiations all the way back in Kyoto and now he's facilitating the red plus negotiations uh in the lca trek and he's going to tell us the latest thank you again to the organisers for inviting me it is the third uh year in a row that have been asked to update the participants of forest day on the state of the negotiations um thank you especially to my friend francesi more than uh the director general of c4 who has trusted me to do this um in the first i've always been nervous doing this and in the first uh year i did this i wrote everything uh in in in the paper and my computer and and read it uh verbatim so that i won't make a mistake in the second year last year in this was in capenhegan last year in in cancun i was a bit more confident so i still wrote it down this time in my ipad but decided i won't read it and just uh you know go with the flow anyway my ipad failed me there so i had to really go with the flow but it was still written all down i could do it this time i just did bullets because i feel more confident uh having made a mistake in the last two years in talking about the negotiations and for that i also thank my fellow negotiators for all here who have sort of trusted me when i say publicly uh what's happening in in the negotiations uh we do have among negotiators a certain uh ethic of confidentiality that that's important to be able to trust each other as we express our national interest in in these uh negotiations at the same time i do belong to the new breed of negotiators that believe in full transparency uh and participation of stakeholders in these uh negotiations so i even try to risk sometimes and tweet and Facebook a lot about the negotiations in any case i think to understand where we are now with with red plus my main responsibility is on red plus finance but i suppose i can also update you on on the substa decision which was adopted uh last night because to understand what's going to happen in the next week on red plus finance you need to understand the substa decision that was adopted uh yesterday with great difficulty and drama all the way down to the last minute down to the last few um minutes that were given to us in these negotiations um to understand is that you have to understand the three pillars of of red plus now in in the negotiations in the whole climate uh UNFCC context but i think it's also reflects what's in the real world the first is that for red plus to work you have to have an mrv system national reference levels a good technical basis for actually assessing uh national performance on emissions with respect to forest that that's one second a robust system of safeguards and also informing each other of how we are respecting those safeguards that's very important because that reminds us that forest to forest of multiple functions forest produce and provide multiple ecosystem services and it is to our peril if we reduce it or commodify it to carbon that's very important and that's why those two tracks have always gone together with the third track which is one of finance because all of these safeguards have to be financed implementation have to be financed the setting up of the mrv system of to be financed and ultimately when you do avoid emissions at the same time producing co benefits that has to be paid for because that's the whole point of all of this right when you call it compensation or positive incentives that thing is that at the end of the road you have to finance the last phase the resource base uh phase of of red plus so the negotiations have always been tracking these three areas uh and in Copenhagen uh as i predicted then uh we were able to reach agreement essentially on how to deal with the first two it wasn't adopted because of the failure to adopt anything in Copenhagen but that same agreement was essentially adopted in cancun except for the finance part the third track the third pillar uh that was postponed because there was a difficulty in cancun for us to have any real meeting time the negotiators to thresh out the various issues around around finance so that was left with lca but safeguards and in this case safeguards were agreed uh in respect for indigenous peoples respect for stakeholders environmental integrity uh transparency and effectiveness in governance all of that was approved in in cancun but in cancun it was also decided that we needed to enforce this in some way this is of course enforced nationally but at the international level we need to have some kind of sharing of information so the provision the creation of an information system so that countries actually know how they're implementing the safeguards and what that system will be would be decided in the next cup which is here and essentially in in in sub-sta yesterday uh it was adopted a first guidance i call it the first guidance because if you look at the decision it says that uh this is the this is the guidance that we have for developing the system of information on safeguards but in the next session of sub-sta we will consider the need for additional guidance and if such guidance is needed then we will uh consider such guidance and then that should be given to the cop to the next cop for for approval there's been some criticism of that and i understand that i mean i i would have preferred a much more detailed guidance at the outset i mean i actually started that way but as a as a safeguards advocate myself when i started looking at the content the possible content and making it more detailed i realized that we are flying blind into this you know i mean uh that there's very little experience of safeguards in in in the world that's directly related to red and it's actually better if you have that experience first before we detail the guidance so i actually welcome the space for a year maybe maybe even more in in fact i probably prefer more so that there's real experience on the ground so we know what kind of information really is needed to enforce the safeguards i really don't care about the bureaucracy about all of this i mean i think yeah me hater he was talking i saw in the c4 tweet that you know that we're we're we're drowning you know the implementation in a lot of a lot of forms a lot of bureaucracy and that that's really wrong you know i think you can report and say you got on a single page but the right page right the right questions have to be asked and i don't think we are there yet in asking the right questions so i welcome this decision of sub stuff which actually says we will review what we have on the basis of consistency comprehensiveness effectiveness um and there's one more word i forget transparency in the way the information around safeguards is provided so the word is cut out for us in the next year to to to do that but this is all in the spirit of advancing implementation the real breakthrough i think as well in the subset decision is the decision on reference levels which brings us closer now to developing the mrv system that's needed for red plus two to work namely now for a while there yesterday uh afternoon we actually thought uh that there would be no agreement simply because it's so technical there's so many things to be done we had a very big political issue around adjustment according to national circumstances which some of us are you know concerned about can can can have can can have impacts on environmental integrity but we were i think able to start it out and i feel quite happy with with the results at least it gives countries guidance in fact on how they will now construct reference levels the more important the importance from an environmental integrity is that countries agree that that will be assessed that they're that they're um offer of what their forest reference levels or forest emission levels will be uh will will will be assessed by by will will undergo an assessment process and and i think that's the that's the welcome thing with these two sort of pillars uh progressing this well we now have the third pillar next week which i am responsible for and i'll say red plus financed i mean the the self interest in me when i was watching the the you know the masterful i call it a masterful uh chairing of uh peter graham of canada and my colleague from the philippines wiki taule corpus as they brought the sub star decision to a closure whenever for a moment when it seemed like they were not going to arrive at the decision i said well that means they don't have to work next week because although there is no link between finance and safeguards and you know and i mean there's no negotiating link the reality is that we've always seen this as needing to progress together and in fact it was in a way an an an anomaly that finance did not progress uh while the other two areas progressed i mean it was an anomalous in the context of the cancun negotiation because of the cancun negotiate the dynamics of the cancun negotiations which we don't have now i think parties here uh don't you know there's a lot of openness a lot of uh uh willingness to undergo a really consultative and participatory process among the parties um and so but now with these two things in place i think there's a good chance and i feel confident that we will be able to arrive at an agreement in uh in in the next week on on red plus finance so at least on a work programme on red plus finance for the third phase the negotiations in the lc is simply about the third phase uh and and and people forget that sometimes it's not about all of finance on red plus it's about financing resort based actions the third phase of of red plus uh there's a problem to the extent that there's still a lot of issues around phase one and phase two and whether a main money is even available for for phase two and so so that that's a tricky thing because the mandate of my group is really just about the third phase but how can you talk about the third phase of your problems in the phase in the first two phases right so there's some opening there but i don't know how how how wide that opening opening would be but the main focus will be on on financing resort based action um the truth is that that's a bit far away and we actually have time to do this properly so the goal is actually to arrive at at a program of action at a work program that could lead us to really constructing then what we call the buddalities and the procedures for for for this last phase of red plus i mean that the provision of incentives and or the compensation if you want to use the the the term and and for that i had produced a one page text for negotiation because we only have a few days of negotiation left but it's potentially if most of it survive or if the parties are even in block as i expect them to improve it i think it could be a text that could move this process forward for the first time first of all like like everything else the text reminds us of this link again between safeguards mrv and finan so that that's important it reminds us that forest has multiple functions multiple provides multiple ecosystem service that's that's really if we look at the preamble all parts and paragraph one you know that's what it says essentially and that my intent when i drafted that as chairman was to to be sure that when we construct this system which is carbon might be carbon based it is done knowing what the context is and knowing that in the real world the carbon ecosystem service cannot be separated from the other ecosystem services and all have to be paid for together with it and it's very important to remind ourselves of that and then for the first time the text actually mentions potential sources for the third phase the usual public bilateral multilateral private sources for finance market based mechanisms and a very innovative idea coming from one party of an integrated adaptation mitigation mechanism that could be used i mean so i'm actually quite excited with the possibility of discussing these different mechanisms just as a you know as a listing for purposes then of doing the work to identify what the implications are for this mechanism which that's important particularly for the new ones i i prefer to stay away from the gcf and the usual multilateral bilateral thing because we sort of know that and there's that's being discussed and the finance group of the primary change but i would really like to discuss this new idea as the the role of the private sector the market based mechanisms this new idea of a of a of a combined and joint mechanism and then what are the implications so the text actually then calls for a work program around these options to to look at its implications to look at its relationships to to safeguards for example and how it implements that first what technical paper by the by the by the secretary then an expert workshop in the next year going to then the pop for decision i mean if in fact a decision has to be if a decision is necessary next year so for this part of red plus which is well for red plus itself if we conclude this negotiation successfully as we did with sub-star this actually brings red plus essentially from the political to the technical from the political to implementation in the real world of course all of us who implement things also know the political always is there but essentially the bulk of it now is going to be in the field that implementation i think it's a welcome welcome thing that's a signal that many of you have been been been been been waiting for and it's good for the climate process that there's something like this is now on the way and it's now launched uh but within sort of the red plus and then this is my last point there within the red plus uh context we do have a new agenda that will come about i mean so as red plus negotiators we do not have to retire yet although i might retire but but we don't have to because there's a drivers of the forestation and there's the link to agriculture and to land use change and forestry and that was postponed i i i you know i'd be guilty for that but it's from a from a political negotiating point of view it was just not possible to deal with that in the Copenhagen text and also in cancun um so but but that is now on the table because that was postponed for the next call so the subsidisation has something about drivers of the forestation um and and and and and the agreed thing there was that this is a broad discussion uh that will happen next and and it will be an agenda setting discussion if there's an agriculture program uh let's adapt and it could converge with that uh but it also could go its own way because of its link to to to forest so we'll see and and we'll see as well what what happens in the agriculture discussions so in the end uh how do i feel about where we are now from a negotiating point of view i actually feel feel quite good i mean i'm not completely happy with the result of sub-star uh but i think i feel like we the train isn't going in the right uh uh direction especially if we're now going to the area of implementation thank you thanks very much tony let me without further ado introduce our fourth speaker mr odiga odiga he is chairman of the cross river state forestry commission in nigeria an area that's hugely important for biodiversity of course as well as uh for forest recipient of the 2003 goldman prize for africa and the red plus coordinator in his state and mr odiga is going to give us all an update from the governor's climate and forests task force thank you very much richard for the introduction um fellow panallist uh distinguished ladies and gentlemen um giving the global updates on forest and climate change isn't it it's a rare opportunity to be given this chance to do that and i'm quite grateful to see sifo and the forestry five for giving me this opportunity um essentially has to do with our determination to witness a transformational change from the threat we are facing from climate change and i think every one of us is celebrating that transformation the need for transformation from transformation occasion by action i take a cue from the woman we have been celebrating all morning it is her action that moves us forward and we are celebrating that standing before you i am a product of her decision to take action because she aroused in me a Latin interest and passion soon by my grandfather on the need to take care of nature this is what she did i have been on with the campaign to protect the last tropical rainforest in Nigeria somehow in 2002 i was privileged to make a physical contact with this lady at WSSD in Jobog here in South Africa in a forum organized by Ed Chatter where she had the opportunity to make a presentation and show a short video like we saw today and in that video it demonstrated the power that we have to make change happen through action using her green belt movement now i asked myself what do you do to make a difference in the world i told myself go do precisely the same thing and her action aroused in me the environmentalism and then the need to become a tree planter not long thereafter in 2003 just with that inspiration i want the good one environmental price for Africa now there is somebody who did something very distinct something very unique that sport me out why am i saying so we have had plenty of words different meetings what is seriously lacking is the need for action at that sifo that the level we are today in terms of knowledge concerning the issue of forest and red is at the instance of sifo from forest day one to forest day five people cannot test today that if you didn't come to forest day you missed the car so not only are people brought together with diverse background to interact and to see what action to take but there's tons and tons of material and information and knowledge that is available that we all take home and it's sufficiently given us a good grounding on what these issues are and that is concrete action that is motivating change now that is at that level i know that there are other changes in the level of unred countries are taking action then you have fcpf but what level i think we are doing something substantial that is touching where it matters most is at the gcf level this is the governor's climate and forest tax force where the government that is closer to the people at the grass food they are taking concrete action now today we have 16 states and provinces their governors have come together and taken a decision 16 states from six countries of america brazil indonesia peru and nigeria they've come together say look red is good red is something constructive yes we all agree but the thing that is lacking how do we make change happen on ground and these 16 state governors and province of governors and of states and provinces are controlling forests tropical high forests of 25 20 percent and they are influencing it substantially so if we do an audit of what is happening constructive work is going on i can speak very precisely like in brazil three of the five states are influencing national policy in brazil on red program you come to my country nigeria from my state my state let the way to nigeria becoming a red state that wasn't the case until the state government resolved that yes rather than protect the forest or use the forest for timber concession we are going to protect it for carbon concession that is constructive and so to now that has given the nation the pride of becoming a red ready nation that is the action of a government at the grass food and has moved forward to make the ordinary people know that yes if there's a paradigm shift from using forests to just to get timber to managing forests for carbon concession the article of trade has become carbon then those who live in live on survive on forests that will be used for carbon concession need to understand the whole trade around the article called carbon they need to measure it they need to know just like they used to know before that yes in this tree this is the volume of timber that can be extracted they need to know this is the volume of carbon that our forest is able to to muster and put out on sale and this is the worth of that carbon this is the price we are likely going to get these are the benefits so this is what GCF states are doing this is what I can boast of precisely in my study that the ordinary person they are even know the farmers themselves are able to find out measure the carbon in the tree is what I will call demystification of science until we bring it down to their level they are willing they are ready and they are able to comprehend this science and then use it to positively protect the resource that we are talking about and thereby mitigate the climate change crisis so I think that there's quite some positive things that are going on there but however as we talk about progress there's the need to look at some problems challenges that we face as I have given us the so much of energy that we put into organising cup and other meetings so much of resources are put in there but my question once in a while is this how accountable are we for instance there's individual accountability we've come in here we get all the terms of knowledge that we can get from cup when we go back do we wait to come back the next cup again then we talk like this and go back now how do we translate this knowledge that we have gotten from siffl to our boss to our colleagues to our families I imagine that if out of 1200 of us precisely 1200 as Americans will put it 1200 of us here if we go back each of us haven't known the value the forest place in our life and they need to extend the forest cover of the world so as to mitigate climate change and enjoy the benefit as multiple benefits associated with forest if we take action that yes before I come back to the next cup I will plant a hundred trees I think that all of us here do 1200 of us could have to get that planted 120 000 trees that could be something like 120 hectares of forest which we can review back imagine that and if we do that every year imagine what that will that is as individuals and I tell you the power of individual action is very enormous let's leave the change we hope to see that we preach about I did that there's a young lady here she came from she's an American she came through UK to do a postgraduate one she met me while raising three years back while raising my own private nursery to plant trees because I cut that from Wangali that yes as you mobilize people to plant trees if I don't have the capacity to mobilize people I can leave the change I wish to see I have my private nursery that I raise indigenous trees to plant that if we do that if we give ourselves the tax of doing that there will be the transformation so the greatest need we need to do problem is that we need to have to be individually accountable for the knowledge that we get from here the things that we take from the contacts we meet to make sure that we transform the ed extend the forest cover with that another challenge we really look at is that insufficient allocation of resources to make sure this transformational change happens imagine the preparations that we do pre cup and cup and then also post cup there's a trick about coast post cup the activities that we carry out at the national level as generally rather than review and see how to implement what we have done here we prepare for the next cup in our post cup activities rather than ensuring that have we been able to justify the knowledge we gain from cup so there's a need to commit imagine the volume of preparation at different national level and at international level global level let's aggregate that amount of money if we put only 10% of that total amount put in preparation into concrete activities underground I bet you there will be more meaningful impact another issue of consent we need to look around is this as we talk about forest forest is not here town well exceptional I can see a lot of forest in Dublin but places like London places like Washington places like Abuja that's not where the forest is that we're talking about the forest is right there in your group and as we sit here to decide and talk about forest there is a man with an axe and a power chainsaw who is poor who is hungry whom I talk to please don't cut down the forest this is how he's helping you he tells me yes o digger you're right but don't forget a home an empty sack cannot stand a rent you can't confront that man to let him live the forest alone when his wife is about putting to bed she is between death and life you're asking him to live the forest alone but the logger is tapping him by the side you need 200 dollars to take your wife to the hospital here you have 200 dollars to let go those trees there what would that man do to live the trees or to live the 200 dollars I bet you he's be wise man he prefers he loves his wife he will take the 200 dollars and let the trees go so that he will protect the wife's life so these are the realities that we face daily that if we're able to make these things happen on ground we're most likely to succeed in protecting our forest we have prospects in protecting the forest in allowing the forest to stay for all of us there's a lot of prospects I bet you next year when we come back and we channel our energies in constructive ways and affecting our society where it matters and where it matters most I have the passion to protect the forest courtesy of my grandfather who at the age of five nurtured the seed to be friend to nature he did that because he would tell me he would insist that you have to plant a tree and that is the culture I made that everything was symbolic and associated with marking sharp events with the planting of trees for instance if a child is born and the navel is to drop the traditional thing is to plant a tree with that navel and so there's a sense of attachment and ownership with that so if we can go back and pick our children and begin the culture of tree planting a way of life with the next generation I think they'll be much more responsible in terms of stewardship towards the forest and responsibility less ladies and gentlemen pursue action that is the only thing that will bring us the change we hope to see as I conclude let me tell us a story a story that borders on inaction I tell my stories about associated with the forest animals and animals generally that is how we were instructed that is how we're able to learn as children a farmer together with the wife were in the farmhouse they had problems rats were treating problems in the house so they had to go to the market the body trap they came back when they came back the rats saw it and was afraid he ran out and met the chicken and told the chicken that please it appears they brought something like it something that is not very friendly into the house the chicken just made the sound and ran away said well rat that is your own cup of tea we are not bothered with that the rat left frustrated and make the good it appears they have brought something inside that house I'm not very comfortable with that we need to pay attention to the good man meh that is give me that is none of my business and left he now went to the cow and complained the same to the cow the cow moved oh I really pity your situation because they will release crush you to death he went back to the house frustrated that's faithful night the trap caught something the farmers were moved to go and see behold the trap caught a snake by detail and as she approached the snake bit her the following morning she became ill and feverish and she was taken to the hospital and she was receiving attention the first recommendation is that in order to bring down the fever she needed to take something hot some hot meal something like what we call pepper soup gets the first choice in the preparation of pepper soup it is the chicken the chicken was used to prepare the pepper soup for the farmer's wife to recover incidentally the the fever became so intense and she needed to spend so much time in the hospital and of course that will attract visitors all the sympathizers who come around and there was a need to entertain them cook food for them and they needed plain tea meat guess the next thing to use in preparing the meal the good was used to prepare the meal this fever never subsided and eventually unfortunately the woman died the next issue let's bury the woman and many people will be invited to attend the funeral service and will need plenty of meat to cook and so the cow was used to prepare the meal to entertain everybody so for them refusing for being complacent nonchalant about it of course the rat sympathized with them what had befallen them but the chicken that good and the cow they paid dearly with our lives that is a gentleman the threat from climate change is real the result of inaction could costly the time to act is now thank you very much