A Tale of Two Continents Ecosystem Services in Latin America and East and Southern Africa

EM Market Insights :: Communities and Developing Countries A Tale of Two Continents Ecosystem Services in Latin America and East and Southern Africa 2006 Environmental Benefits • Mohawk Paper 1,730 pounds of paper used • FSC-certified • 100% post-consumer • manufactured with windpower Savings derived from using post-consumer recycled fiber in lieu of virgin fiber: 16.37 trees not cut down 47.26 lbs waterborne waste not created 6,953 gallons water/wastewater flow saved 769 lbs solid waste not generated 1,514 lbs atmospheric emissions eliminated 11,594,000 BTUs energy not consumed Savings derived from using windpower: 799 lbs air emissions (C02, SO2 and NOX) not generated This amount of wind energy is equivalent to: planting 54 trees not traveling 865 miles in an average automobile Environmental benefits determined by Mohawk Paper Environmental Savings Calculator EM Market Insights :: Communities and Developing Countries A Tale of Two Continents Ecosystem Services in Latin America and East and Southern Africa For the past two years, the Ecosystem Marketplace has been delivering the latest information about market mechanisms and payments for ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration, water quality, and biodiversity. To get a better sense of how the concepts of environmental markets, market-like mechanisms and payments for ecosystem services are likely to impact communities in developing countries, the Ecosystem Marketplace has collected stories from two regions: Latin America and East and Southern Africa. In these stories we see the new and innovative ways that the value of nature’s services is being accounted for—all emphasizing the strengths of each region’s diverse ecosystems and the challenges that face the people who live among them. In the following pages, we hope to spotlight the uniqueness of each region through a series of feature articles, profiles of environmental leaders, and personal perspectives. Our hope is that by putting these stories together, we may be able to start making some unusual—but fruitful—connections in this nascent field. Article Name Introduction Reuniting Two Continents: The Future of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services It is a truism that the majority of the world’s biodiversity is to be found in the tropics, in those parts of the world commonly referred to as developing countries. It is here that the magic and variety of the world’s ecosystems are in constant and vibrant bloom. It is here, also, that the struggle to preserve the world’s biodiversity will be won or lost. And it is here that the many services provided by nature can fully be appreciated. To get a better sense of how the concepts of environmental markets, market-like mechanisms and payments for ecosystem services are likely to impact communities in developing countries, the Ecosystem Marketplace has collected stories from two regions: Latin America and East and Southern Africa. In these stories we see the new and innovative ways that the value of nature’s services is being accounted for—all emphasizing the strengths of each region’s diverse ecosystems and the challenges that face the people who live among them. Ecosystems, in these two regions, may appear quite different. Strikingly arid areas within parts of Southern Africa’s Cape region seem, at first glance, to have nothing in common with the leafy, multihued greens that fill much of the Amazon watershed. Yet visitors to areas within South America and Africa will notice many connections. Not only is the geology essentially the same in Brazil and the western regions of Southern Africa (looking closely at a map will reveal that the two continents were in fact connected many millions of years ago), but the human and institutional challenges that the two regions face are also remarkably alike. And since the problems are somewhat similar, it follows that some of the solutions, too, might be applicable in both places. Clearly, there is no “one size fits all” approach to payments for ecosystem services, but this does not mean that Latin America and Africa have nothing to learn from each others’ experiences. To start the dialogue between these two vibrant regions, the Ecosystem Marketplace has compiled some of its best stories on emerging markets and market-like mechanisms for ecosystem services in Latin America and in East and Southern Africa. For the past two years, the Ecosystem Marketplace has been delivering the latest information about market mechanisms and payments for ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration, water quality, and biodiversity. In the following pages, we hope to spotlight the uniqueness of each region through a series of feature articles, profiles of environmental leaders, and personal perspectives. Our hope is that by putting these stories together, we may be able to start making some unusual—but fruitful—connections in this nascent field. Latin America: The Early Innovator Latin America’s expansive—and threatened—swaths of diverse forests are known as global strongholds of carbon, biodiversity, and a host of other ecosystem services. This diversity also extends to the ways in which innovative Latin American programs have explored how environmental markets and market-like mechanisms can be used to support the environment and local communities. “Because Latin America has been at the i Introduction forefront of these issues for the past ten years, you see a wide spectrum of markets and market-like programs—including regulatory, voluntary, and ad-hoc projects,” says Carina Bracer, manager of the regional Katoomba Group for Tropical America. Read on and you’ll get a taste of this diversity with stories about rehabilitated cacao plantations in Costa Rica, reforestation in the Sierra Gorda Biosphere Reserve in central Mexico, and a novel carbon fund in Argentina, the first of its kind in the developing world. All are examples of the different ways that market mechanisms and payments for ecosystem services can be used in developing countries. The Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism has led the way for some of these programs. Now, new openings in these rulings focusing on the value of avoided deforestation could boost attention and funding to even more forest-oriented projects. “One of the key challenges to conservation in developing countries is the lack of financial resources for conservation measures such as the management of national parks and other conservation units,” says Beto Borges, director of Forest Trends’ Communities and Markets program. The possibility of selling carbon credits for avoided deforestation, he says, “has the potential to provide much-needed funds for conservation in developing countries, where traditional forest communities hold directly or indirectly the control of very large areas extremely rich in biodiversity.” Pulling together the region-wide programs could offer a status check for what’s working, what isn’t, and how to address both problems and successes. Bringing together this wealth of work, too, could be the catalyst for making ecosystem services more attractive to private sector investors as well as to governments and NGOs. East and Southern Africa: Looking to the Future This same private sector potential could open up new doors for African communities looking for novel ways to address conservation of both the environment and of rural livelihoods. Carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, and watershed protection are among the candidates for emerging programs that seek to pay for ecosystem services. From grassy savannas to woodlands, from wide river valleys to offshore coral reefs, Africa’s incredibly varied ecosystems play a critical role in the lives of its inhabitants. Several forward-thinking projects have already established themselves as what may be the first of many approaches to valuing this natural capital. In these pages, you’ll find stories covering South Africa’s visionary Working for Water program and its many offshoots, a tree-planting program that ties farmers in several African countries with investors worldwide, a Cape Town–based firm’s launch of the world’s first structured instrument for carbon trading, and more examples of projects starting to link markets and market-like mechanisms with the environment. “While traditional methods of protecting the environment can be effective, mainstreaming payments for environmental services into policy and planning can complement these approaches and provide incentives for conservation,” says Alice Ruhweza, coordinator of the East and Southern Africa Katoomba Group. “In particular, I’m very interested in payments for watershed services since these have not taken off in most countries and yet there are clearly problems of water scarcity everywhere in East and Southern Africa.” It’s clear that there’s a need for increased attention on Africa’s natural and human environments. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment points to the degradation and disappearance of ecosystems on an enor- ii A Tale of Two Continents Ecosystem Services in Latin America and East and Southern Africa Reuniting Two Continents: The Future of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services mous scale across many of the continent’s regions—a situation that threatens biodiversity, access to water, food security, and other arenas that affect economic development, and even life itself. A Lively Debate For any of these programs to succeed, it seems critical to tailor their design to the needs of individual ecosystem and communities. However, a little across-the-ocean sharing of models and methods seems

Load more