Massive reforestation

BANTAY GOBYERNO  

Ike Señeres

Words have meanings and the wrong interpretation of words could result in the wrong outcomes. Add to that the fact that development programs need to have an overall framework, otherwise the outcome could either be wrong or it would fall short of actual development needs. Perhaps this is what happened in the case of countless “tree planting” initiatives all over the country over the past many years.

Of course it is obvious that reforestation needs more than just planting trees. As a matter of fact, reforestation needs more than just planting a few trees here and there. Going back to the basics, the clear objective of reforestation is to grow back the trees in specific areas of what used to be the forest.

Going direct to the point, reforestation should have percentage targets in terms of how much percent of the deforested areas should be reforested.

Anyone can plant a seedling, but not everyone can grow a tree. That is just like saying that any woman can bear a baby, but not every mother can raise a child.

It may just be a matter of semantics, but strictly speaking, we are really planting seedlings and not trees. And if it is really a tree that we are referring to, we should already call it replanting trees and not planting trees. And if it is a seed that we are talking about, we should just call it sowing seeds of trees and not planting seeds. Pardon the exaggeration of meanings, but I just want to get to the bottom of the problem, as to why so many “tree planting” initiatives have failed before in the past.

While on a trip to Thailand many years ago to visit some orchards, I noticed how a farm worker was watering a coconut tree. My first reaction was that the farm worker was probably stupid, but then I realized that a coconut tree or any other tree for that matter needs water to grow, and for it to grow well, it should have a supply of water that should not be left to the incidence of rain alone.

In other words, that Thai farm worker was actually the right thing, because he was probably doing it at a time of the year when rains were hard to come by, and the coconut trees had to be watered some other way. Later on, in that same trip, I found out that Thai farm workers actually apply fertilizers on the coconut trees also, something that we almost never do here in the Philippines.

Six African nations have committed to reforest at least 78.3 million acres in the African continent, and four more countries are in line to join the program. The African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative (AFR100) has been officially adopted by the African Union and more than 1.5 billion dollars have been pledged by various international organizations to fund the initiative. AFR100 was announced at the 21st meeting of the Conference of Partners (COP21), the meeting in Paris where an agreement was finally reached by participating countries to reduce carbon emissions as a strategy to reverse global warning that is the cause of climate change.

According to the Global Restoration Initiative (GRI) at the World Resources Institute (WRI), there are about 700 million hectares in the African continent that could be restored to natural forests or areas with some form of agroforestry. GRI cited deforestation, loss of soil nutrients, erosion and overgrazing as some of the contributing factors that prevent full environmental and economic productivity.

In a related development, officials of Greenpeace said that they are worried about the over emphasis on restoration, because according to them, restoration programs are more expensive than the prevention of deforestation. They added that many areas that many areas in need of forest restoration may require extensive soil restoration first.

Learning from the experience of the African nations, I now think that the target of our own National Greening Program (NGP) should have been the restoration of lost forests in terms of hectares, and not the planting of trees. As it is now, it is very difficult to measure the success or failure of the NGP, because there is no way to inspect the trees where they are supposed to have been planted already.

There is also no way to find out whether the seedlings (not really trees) that were planted were cared for and nourished until such time that they would have grown into mature trees. When counting the number of hectares that have been restored, there should be a standard as to how many trees should have been planted per hectare.

In the case of the African Union, the commitments were made by the member countries, and it is implied that these countries already set aside the resources needed to make the initiative happen from their end of the equation, before they made their pledge.

If countries can do that on a continental scale, perhaps provinces could also do it on a national scale. After all, it is not too difficult for each province to measure how much of their deforested areas could still be restorable.

Once they are able to measure the total number of hectares that could be reforested, then they can already set their own provincial targets on an annual basis, until they are able to achieve 100% of their targets at the end of their timeframe.

In reality, this idea to require the provinces to set their own reforestation targets should not be viewed as an imposition, because the provinces could make money from these reforestation initiatives not just once, but thrice. Yes, it is not just twice, but thrice.

The first source of money is the “Debt for Nature” scheme, a global program that could be used to pay our foreign debts not with money, but with “nature credits”. Of course the national government would not make any earnings from this scheme, but it could generate savings because it does not have to pay with cash anymore. In turn, the national government could convert these savings into cash and give it to the provinces.

Aside from earning from “nature credits”, the provinces could also earn from “carbon credits”. There is hope that because of the agreements reached in COP21, the global carbon credits scheme will gain new momentum. The third source of money is from the taxes that the private businesses will pay to the provinces when the local economy grows because of the multiplier effects of the massive reforestation programs. There is a fourth benefit, although it is not directly in terms of money. More trees would mean less flooding, less erosion and less pollution. Down the line, more trees would mean more water from the ground, more rains from the sky and more fruits from the forests. Add to that more cooking fuel and more electricity from gasifier power plants.

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