PRESS RELEASE
India’s Draft Forest
Policy will be counterproductive to the country’s Paris Climate Commitments: says
Climate Scorecard, a global civil society coalition!
New Delhi, 23rd May 2018 – The Climate Scorecard,
that tracks the implementation of Paris Climate Commitments of top Greenhouse
Gas (GHG) emitting countries, has analysed the Draft Forest Policy 2018 of
India and has found out that it has potential to derail the country’s Paris
Goals. “We have found the policy to be a
retrogressive, state-centered policy in intent, even as concepts like climate
change and REDD+ are liberally sprinkled in the text”, said Ranjan Panda,
Country Manager for India of the Climate Scorecard, in a press release.
“It is similar in intent and purposes to the Compensatory
Afforestation Funds Act, 2016 scored by us last month, in that it seeks to enhance
the control of forest departments over forests at the cost of communities.
Given the past record of forest bureaucracy in India, there is little hope that
this exclusionary, bureaucracy-centered forest policy will yield any positive
results in mitigation and adaptation of climate change, and likely will have
very negative outcomes”, said Ranjan Panda.
Ranjan Panda further said, “Our assessment found out that
the 2018 Draft Forest Policy walks back on the gains of 1988 Forest Policy and
the Forest Rights Act and seeks to go back to a state and private sector-based
forest governance, which would not be healthy for India’s natural forests as
well as climate commitments”.
“The policy does recognise the challenges of ‘Climate Change’
but its strategies have been criticised by conservationists, ecologists,
tribals and community representatives. The main criticisms are: i) its use of
climate change threats to recentralise power with the forest bureaucracy at the
cost of communities; ii) its deliberate subversion of the landmark Forest
Rights Act; and iii) it facilitates grabbing of burdened forest lands by
private companies for industrial plantations”, said Ranjan Panda in the
release.
Ranjan Panda further said that, “The immense opportunity for
climate change mitigation and adaptation through a rights based forest
protection and restoration movement provided by the Forest Rights Act has been
totally ignored in this new Forest Policy draft”.
The Draft Forest Policy 2018 has been given ONE STAR* rank by
the Climate Scorecard because it contains strategies for climate change
mitigation which are unworkable; fails to recognise the rights of tribal and
forest dweller communities of forests; promotes industrial plantations by the
private sector that may impact India’s Paris Climate Goals negatively,
informed Panda.
For further details, contact:
Ranjan Panda
Country Manager for India,
Climate Scorecard
Convenor, Combat Climate Change
Network, India
Mobile: +91 9437050103/7008706434
Tweet @ranjanpanda
Blog: https://climatecrusaders.blogspot.in/
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ABOUT CLIMATE
SCORECARD
Climate
Scorecard is a global initiative to ensure that the Paris Agreement meets its
goal of preventing the earth’s atmosphere from exceeding the 2 degree Celsius
global warming tipping point. Recent scientific reports, e.g. by the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environmental
Programme (UNEP) warn that country emission reduction pledges, made to the
Paris Agreement, are insufficient to prevent this from happening. Therefor
Climate Scorecard is supporting a global campaign aimed at persuading leading
greenhouse gas emitting countries to take further steps to reduce their
emissions so that the Paris Agreement does not fail. This campaign, carried out
through social media and in collaboration with local partner organizations, will
provide citizens with monthly News Briefs and Action Alert messages about what
their countries are or are not doing to further their commitment to the Paris
Agreement. Climate Scorecard is an open source initiative managed through a
partnership of two non-profit organizations-The Global Citizens Initiative ( www.theglobalcitizensinitiative.org) and EarthAction ( www.earthaction.org )
Learn More: www.climatecorecard.org
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*About the Rating System
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Climate
Scorecard uses a 4-star system to rate the country activities we report on
each month:
★★★★
The country is Moving Forward to combat climate change and support the Paris
Agreement
★★★
The country is moving in the Right Direction but needs to do more to reach
its NDC pledges
★★
The country is Standing Still, with no change in either direction
★
The country is Falling Behind, and the activity is counterproductive to its
Paris Agreement goals
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