Deforestation

The 2015 Paris agreement incorporates a framework of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (Redd+). Here are three reasons why Redd+ is a valuable tool in the fight against climate change, and responses to three common criticisms of the framework that no longer hold up.

Tropical forests help people live safer, healthier, and more productive lives in many ways, not least by reducing climate change. In fact, tropical forests contribute to achieving more than half of the 17 sustainable development goals agreed by world leaders in 2015.

Last Thursday President Trump announced he’d withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement—a shameful act of self-harm. Condemnation has been swift, widespread, and gratifying. But if dangerous climate change is to be prevented then dissenting statements must...

Most discussions of the linkage between forests and poverty—including one last week at the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF)—focus on how to increase income to poor households from the harvest and sale of forest products. But at least as much attention should be paid to forest destr...