Abstract: The last decade has seen a wave of forest carbon projects across the world, many in
Africa. These have been a response to the pressing challenges of climate change
mitigation. Conserving or enhancing forest carbon stocks is presented as a way both
to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and, most importantly, to offset
emissions elsewhere. A range of new market-based mechanisms have been put in
place to facilitate a variety of offset arrangements through payments and trade in
carbon credits. This is occurring through a variety of institutional arrangements;
some, such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and the Reduced
Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (UN-REDD and REDD+) process
are formally linked with compliance mechanisms associated with international
climate change negotiations and the Kyoto Protocol, while others are linked to
voluntary carbon markets, regulated in different ways (see Arhin and Atela, this
book; Fong Cisneros, 2012). A mass of literature is now asking how forest carbon
projects are unfolding, how they might be most effectively geared to climate
mitigation challenges and how forest users might benefit from them (e.g. Angelsen
et al., 2009, 2012; Corbera and Schroeder, 2010; Blom et al., 2010; Sunderlin et al.,
2014a, 2014b; Luttrell et al., 2013; Pokorny et al., 2013; Schroeder and McDermott,
2014), as well as how such initiatives are presented in the media and policy discourse
(Di Gregorio et al., 2013). At a larger scale, others have been examining the
institutional architectures, funding mechanisms and regulatory and governance
challenges of the new carbon economy, and its associated interventions (Karsenty,
2008; Angelsen, 2008, 2013; Vatn and Angelsen, 2009; Boyd and Goodman, 2011;
Goodman and Boyd, 2011; Boyd et al., 2011; Lederer, 2012a; Stripple and Bulkeley,
2013). Others have been tracking the effects of volatile carbon prices and the
evolution of particular markets, highlighting in recent years the low prices and lackof market spread, as well as irregularities, scams and market politics (Stephan and
Paterson, 2012; Peters-Stanley et al., 2013; Lane and Stephan, 2014).1
Publication Year: 2015
Publication Date: 2015-06-05
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 13
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