Glasgow, Nov. 2 (BNA): World leaders pledged to protect the world’s forests, cut methane emissions and help South Africa get rid of coal at Tuesday’s UN climate summit – part of a series of deals aimed at averting catastrophic global warming.
Britain has hailed the commitment of more than 100 countries to ending deforestation in the next decade as the first major achievement of the conference in the Scottish city of Glasgow, known as COP26 – but experts note that such promises have been made and broken before, according to the Associated Press.
The UK government said it has received pledges from leaders representing more than 85% of the world’s forests to halt and reverse deforestation by 2030. Among them are several countries with huge forests, including Brazil, China, Colombia, Congo, Indonesia, Russia and the USA.
More than $19 billion in public and private funds has been pledged for this plan.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “With today’s unprecedented pledges, we will have a chance to end mankind’s long history as the usher of nature, and instead become its guardian.”
“Let’s end this great chainsaw carnage by making conservation do what we know it can do, and that is to provide jobs and sustainable growth in the long term as well.”
Fulfilling that pledge will be crucial to curbing climate change, experts and observers said, but many note that such big promises have been made in the past – but to little effect.
“Signing the declaration is the easy part,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Twitter. “It is imperative that it be implemented now for the sake of the people and the planet.”
World leaders promised in 2014 to end deforestation by 2030, “but since then deforestation has accelerated in many countries,” said Alison Hoare, research fellow at policy think tank Chatham House.
Forests are important ecosystems and provide a crucial way to absorb carbon dioxide – the main greenhouse gas – from the atmosphere. But the value of wood as a commodity and the increasing demand for agricultural and pastoral lands are leading to widespread and often illegal deforestation, particularly in developing countries.
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