Brussels, 26/07/2016 (Agence Europe) - Convinced that the contribution by European forestry and agriculture is essential to tackling climate change, European NGOs are disappointed at the proposals contained in the Commission's summer package on climate presented on 20 July for addressing emissions from agriculture and forestry and bringing the LULUCF (land use, land-use change and forestry) sector into the climate-energy package (EUROPE 11598).
Forests are known as carbon sinks for their ability to absorb CO2 but they have to be used to reduce emissions and not to allow member states to pollute more, the development and forest and environment protection NGOs say. However, under the proposal on effort sharing among member states in sectors not covered by the ETS (transport, agriculture, buildings and waste), up to 280 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent in forestry allowances may be used to reach national targets over the whole 2021-2030 period - a major weakness that will means pollution can continue so long as trees are planted, the NGOs state.
The proposed LULUCF regulation that will allow member states to offset deforestation emissions by planting trees should also be treated with caution, in the NGOs' view.
Green light for more emissions. Non-ETS sectors are required to reduce their emissions by 30% between 2021 and 2030 compared with 2005 - an “entirely inadequate” target, according to Oxfam - and the LULUCF flexibility that can be used further weaken the rules, says the NGO. For Oxfam, this flexibility, which is in direct proportion with the size of the agriculture sector, could lead to additional emissions equal to 1.35 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent by 2030 in agriculture, surface transport and buildings. Oxfam, therefore, calls for an additional 15% reduction in cuts (to 45%) and a further review of all of the EU's 2030 emission cut targets to guarantee the EU stays on track to meet the Paris Agreement's more ambitious goal of keeping average global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius.
“The Commission's proposals are entirely inadequate and urgently need to be fixed if the EU is to meet the commitments it made in Paris. Through newly proposed 'flexibilities', countries will be able to claim carbon credits by planting trees and from dubious accounting of their forest management instead of insulating homes and investing in more sustainable agriculture and transport. The EU cannot continue to claim climate leadership if it cooks the books”, said Marc-Olivier Herman, Oxfam's expert on climate and energy. The NGO is pressing the European Parliament and member states to “help steer the Commission in the right direction, or they risk turning their back on the millions of lives threatened by climate change”.
A missed opportunity. Fern, an NGO active in “making the EU work for people and forests”, says the Commission proposal will allow member states to emit more greenhouse gas, bringing the EU's headline reduction target of at least 40% by 2030, compared with 1990 levels, down to less than 39%, when the ETS flexibility is taken into account.
“Forests and land in the EU currently absorb more carbon than they emit, which is a good thing. But using this as an excuse to emit more greenhouse gases sends the wrong message”, says Hannah Mowat, Forest and Climate campaigner at Fern. She adds: “Our carbon budget is rapidly diminishing - we already know we need to go below zero emissions in the medium term”. She feels the European Commission has missed an opportunity to embrace the role that forests and land can, and must, play to honour the commitments made in Paris and limit warming to 1.5 degrees. “Work must now begin”, she says, “on making the new LULUCF pillar into a powerful instrument with high environmental integrity to ensure that forests and land are part of the climate solution, not part of the problem”.
What environmental guarantees? BirdLife Europe, a biodiversity conservation NGO, says that the Commission proposal lowers the level of ambition on emissions reduction from sectors such as agriculture, stock rearing and transport, and offsets these emissions with activities such as afforestation. It is concerned that the proposed LULUCF regulation might encourage unsustainable soil use in the name of emissions reduction as it provides a strong incentive for afforestation with no environmental guarantee. It says that afforestation is often intensively managed non-native monoculture plantations which do nothing to help maintain biodiversity and, indeed, may have a negative impact on it.
In Ireland, for example, a country that argues very strongly for afforestation to offset growing emissions levels from agriculture, afforestation has been identified as the second largest threat to EU protected species and habitats, BirdLife Europe points out. It welcomes that the offsets from forests created through fake accounting of emission removals have been limited but believes that stronger efforts are needed in all sectors for the EU to be able to live up to the climate commitments it made in Paris.
“We need to take care of nature's carbon stocks and increase carbon removals in an environmentally sound way, while at the same time cut emissions in all other sectors. It is not a choice of one or the other. We cannot afford to continue with policies that increase emissions from land and forests with the excuse of climate change mitigation, such as current policies on bioenergy and biofuels”, argues Ariel Brunner of BirdLife Europe. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)