REDD+: Location, location, location …

When it comes to providing payments to reduce emissions from deforestation, what sort of projects will work best? Research in Sumatra suggests that scale and location could be crucial in determining their success. Here, scientists from the UK, the US and CIFOR examined the likely impact of Indonesia’s first emissions reduction initiative, which focuses on a protected area in the uplands. 

‘We wanted to compare the benefits of this initiative with an alternative scenario of a RED project covering a much larger area in northern Sumatra,’ explains David Gaveau of the UK-based Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology. The second area contains large expanses of lowland peat forest, rich in orangutans, and already subject to widespread forest clearance.

Using spatial modeling, the scientists predicted that the existing initiative will save 1313 square kilometres of forest from clearance by 2030. However, 7913 square kilometres of forest will be lost outside the protected area. Since the vast majority of orangutans live in the lowlands, the existing initiative will do little to help them. Indeed, a quarter of the population could be lost by 2030 if the status quo prevails. 

‘If we really want to save forests and orangutans, carbon payment projects in northern Sumatra should focus on the lowlands, rather than the upland protected area,’ explains CIFOR scientist Markku Kanninen. The authors concluded that reducing emissions from deforestation would have a greater conservation impact if payments were extended to all remaining carbon-rich tropical forests in northern Sumatra.