In my presentation I will highlight why it is crucial that industrial monoculture tree plantations be ineligible for CDM sink credits. I will focus on four issues that illustrate that plantations must not be confused with forests and that industrial monoculture tree plantations carry high social and environmental risks.

Four aspects that highlight, that plantations are not forests:

• Forests store large amounts of water; they prevent immediate run-off of water when mosses and lichens soak it up and slowly release it. Mosses in a forest are still waterlogged, long after surrounding open areas have dried up.

• Forests are also an important source of clean water, filtering precipitation as it slowly moves through the many layers of a forest and the forest soils.

• Industrial monoculture tree plantations on the other hand use up large quantities of water, resulting in at times drastically lowered groundwater levels. These changes in groundwater not only affect the area covered by the plantation but also surrounding areas, often increasing the risk of erosion [see slides plantations in South Africa].

Negative impacts of industrial monoculture tree plantations are equally present with regards to biodiversity:

• Forests are among the most biologically diverse terrestrial ecosystems. And trees are only one component among many that make up these diverse ecosystems.

• Industrial monoculture tree plantations in contrast are ‘deserts of trees’ — and even that is doing injustice to the desert, which actually is a very diverse ecosystem. But these plantations not only lack the biological diversity of forests, they also have a negative impact on the site, esp. the biological diversity of the soil. Depending on the species used, industrial monoculture tree plantations carry the risk to kill off any potential for natural re-growth a site may have contained , if the wrong species is used [which is the case in the majority of industrial monoculture tree plantations].

There is a third impact of industrial monoculture tree plantations on biological diversity that must be considered: Most industrial monoculture tree plantations in the South are of exotic species.

• Invasive species have often spread beyond the area they were originally planted in, posing a major threat to the native ecosystem and for the people, who may depend on the native species.

• It has often been claimed that exotic tree species used in plantations do not spread, but there is ample evidence of this in fact being the case [South Africa - eucalyptus, Uruguay - accacia]. The Convention on Biological Diversity at its last COP has recognized the danger posed by invasive species and adopted measures to halt the spread of invasive species. Rules for sinks in the CDM, that give credits to plantations composed of exotic species certainly would undermine the CBD COP decision to halt the spread of invasive species.

• Forests are home to millions of forest-dependent people. Forests are they libraries, pharmacies and grocery stores for forest peoples, and the forest is intricately linked with their way of life. Industrial monoculture tree plantations on the other hand have often displaced people from their lands or destroyed their livelihoods by replacing the forest grocery and pharmacy with rows of exotic trees planted purely for commercial purposes.

• Forests are a major reservoir of carbon; they minimize the impacts from extreme weather events. Industrial monoculture tree plantations store nowhere near as much carbon as a forest does. In fact, if planted in wet, peaty soils, they are likely to be sources rather than sinks for a decade and more.

• Industrial monoculture tree plantations are also much more vulnerable than forests to fire and widespread insect outbreaks. The lowering of groundwater levels as well as the use of exotic species result in slow decay of litter, further increasing the risks of fire substantially. This in turn also increases the risk of carbon release, thus increasing the risk of non-permanence of the carbon stock.

Last, a brief remark on additionality. It is difficult to see how a technology, that is well-established and feeds an already existing international pulp, paper and timber market, could be considered additional.

In conclusion, the CDM must not contribute to the expansion of industrial monoculture tree plantations. To avoid this, industrial monoculture tree plantations should be explicitly excluded as a CDM project category. In our view, adequate definitions and modalities should screen out such industrial monoculture plantations. However, clear guidance to the Executive Board is required on how to interpret the eventual rules. Furthermore, a clear signal to project developers is needed that industrial monoculture tree plantations do not qualify for sinks credits in the CDM. An explicit exclusion of industrial monoculture tree plantations is the simplest and safest way to ensure this.

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