Focus
His Royal Highness launches a project to help save tropical rainforests across the world
6th November 2007
The Prince’s Rainforests Project was formed in October 2007 as His Royal Highness’s response to the continued decimation of tropical rainforests around the world.
For decades The Prince of Wales has shown a strong personal interest in environmental issues.
The main themes to which he most often returns are the need for sustainable development, for responsible stewardship of our natural resources and for global co-operation to protect our environmental heritage.
In a continuation of his work in this field, The Prince of Wales gave a speech at a gala event for the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) at Hampton Court Palace.
His Royal Highness announced The Prince’s Rainforests Project, which will work with the WWF and other public and private organisations to put a financial value on the world’s rainforests, as he believes that combating deforestation is likely to be one of the quickest and most cost-effective means of reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
The Prince said: “The problem is that the true value of rainforests to the world community is not understood. Somehow, we have to find ways of putting a price on them which makes them more valuable alive than dead.’
Deforestation – the problem
Some 150,000 square kilometres of tropical rainforest are destroyed each year – an area equivalent to England, Scotland and Wales combined.
Once covering over 7 million square miles around the world, tropical rainforests now cover less than 3 million square miles.
Scientists estimate that 18 to 25 per cent of total global greenhouse gases emissions result from deforestation and the ‘slash and burn’ destruction of the rainforest which releases 7.32 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year.
According to the Stern Review, tropical deforestation is now the second largest source of emissions behind power generation and ahead of the transport sector.
Of equal importance is the fact that rainforests are giant global utilities, acting as a source of carbon dioxide storage and sequestration, water storage, rainfall generation, climate buffering, biodiversity and soil stabilisation. Carbon is stored in trees, soil and biomass. Rainforests help to regulate the climate and sustain the life of some 1.6 billion of the world’s very poorest people.
They are the planet’s lungs, thermostat and air-conditioning system and a critical home for biodiversity, containing ⅔ of all wildlife and plant species.
Currently, the economic incentives to convert rainforests to alternative uses are greater than the incentives to conserve or manage them wisely - and so the forests continue to fall. The clearance of one hectare of forest and conversion to agricultural use gives land worth, on average, £100 – £250 (around $200-500 in United States dollars).
The Prince’s Rainforests Project
The Prince’s Rainforests Project has the support of 12 international companies and the aim will be to work with the private sector, governments and environmental experts to develop a range of practical solutions that can start to be implemented within the next 18 months.
The task is to review, develop and propose practical mechanisms that acknowledge the true value of carbon and the eco-system services provided by the world’s remaining forests.
These solutions need to provide credible incentives to rainforest nations, down to the farmers on the ground, and must “out-compete” the drivers of rainforest destruction.
In his speech at Hampton Court Palace, The Prince spoke of the many challenges ahead.
He said: “Ladies and gentlemen, I am under no illusions about the difficulty of the task ahead – but if nothing is ventured, nothing is gained.
“However . . .it must surely be the ethical duty of wealthy nations, which have created the problem of climate change, to find equitable solutions.
”That means working with developing nations (which incidentally, will suffer most and soonest from climate change) to find ingenious, innovative ways of paying the appropriate price for the ecosystem services provided by the world’s remaining great forests.”