Ghana is beginning to log drowned forests from Lake Volta as a source of high-value tropical logs. Ebony, teak, mahogany and nearly 100 other species have been found on the lake bottom, where they have stood since the construction in 1964 of the Akosombo hydroelectric dam. The venture is expected to earn $100 million per year for many years, and create 1400 jobs.

A Canadian management company, Clark Sustainable Resource Developments, has a contract to log part of Lake Volta, and is taking a sustainable development approach which will create jobs and build infrastructure in Ghana.

Underwater logging is not new, with operations in the US, Canada, Brazil, Malaysia, Cameroon and Ivory Coast, among others.   When the Adirondack Mountains of New York were first logged, hemlocks were felled into lakes and stripped of their bark, used to tan leather. The logs were allowed to sink because they had little value. In the 1960’s, long after logging in the Adirondack Park had stopped, enterprising loggers grappled the now-valuable hemlock logs from the lake bottom. In Malaysia, several large underwater logging operations have removed timber from hydroelectric project lakes. In Canada, the Cheslatta Carrier Nation has been logging Nechako Reservoir of its vast stands of pine, spruce, fir, cedar and hemlock. The value of the forest has been estimated at $2 billion.  Collectively, the worlds drowned forests may be worth $40 billion.

Trees drowned after dam development often remain standing. When cut, they can shoot up to the surface if they are still buoyant. Trees underwater do not decay, because the fungi that decompose wood require oxygen. 

Picture: Tree standing in Lake Volta. Photo courtesy of Clark Sustainable Resource Developments.

Ghana’s ‘miracle’: Logging underwater forests for exotic timber – Yahoo! News UK

Sumatra oak, Quercus sumatrana the southernmost oak, Sumatra, Indonesia. The buttresses and surface roots are typical of many tropical trees. Photograph by Tom Kimmerer

Malaysia has an astonishingly diverse forest flora. One estimate puts the number of tree species in Peninsular Malaysia at over 9,000.  Many of these trees are rare and highly localized.

The state of Perak, in northern Malaysia, has identified five sites where very rare trees are located, and is acting to preserve those sites.  The sites are Segari Forest Reserve, Gunung Bubu and Temengor Forest Reserve, and Taman Negeri Royal Belum (Royal Belum State Park).

Univeristi Kebangsaan Malaysia botanist Prof. Datuk Dr. Abdul Latiff Mohamad said that balau putih, Shorea lumutensis, is found in Segari Forest Reserve and Sungai Pinang Forest Reserve in Lumut, and nowhere else in the world.  Logging of these reserves would likely cause extinction of these species, said Datuk Dr. Abdul Latiff.

Pokok sang, Johannesteijsmannia perakensis, is another rare tree in Perak, found only in Gunung Bubu near Kuala Kangsar, according to Datuk Dr. Abdul Latiff. It is found occasionally in cultivation and is known as Johnny-on-a-stick in the horticulture trade. Local people, known as Orang Asli (original people) use the leaves of Pokok sang for roofing material.

In addition to its exceptional tree flora, Perak is home to four species of Rafflesia, the world’s largest flower.

Picture: Shorea curtisii along a river, Perak, Malaysia. Picture by Tom Kimmerer

Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) will create a model forest to include 400 species of Malaysian forest trees on a 27 hectare site near the campus in Serdang and on a 48 hectare site at the Bintulu campus in Sarawak.  The project will receive nearly $400,000 in funding from Mitsubishi Corporation. Deputy Dean Dr. Mohamad Azani Alias said that the purpose of the project is to plant trees of species that are rare and endemic, found only in certain states.  This promises to be an important project for the future of Malaysian trees.  With over 9,000 species in Peninsular Malaysia, the tree flora of Malaysia is incredibly rich, but many species are poorly known and their conservation status is uncertain.   By creating a refuge near campus for these uncommon species, UPM will be able to increase its efforts in the conservation and biology of rare tree species.  With climate change creating uncertain effects on tree distribution, conservation of rare and endemic species is particularly important.

Note: I am a former visiting lecturer at UPM.

Picture: Canopy shyness in upland dipterocarp forest, Malaysia. Picture by Tom Kimmerer

Andrew Revkin  at Dot Earth has a nice article about the proposal by Al Gore and Wangari Maathai to include forest preservation in carbon-trading markets designed to curb greenhouse gas emissions.  Gore and Maathai, both Nobel Peace Prize laureates for their conservation work, are promoting the work of the Avoided Deforestation Partners.

Tropical forest conversion to other uses currently accounts for about 20% of the world’s carbon budget.  In the Kyoto Protocols, the first plan to reduce world carbon emissions, forests received little attention, mainly because of opposition from environmental groups like the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace.  These organizations feared that counting tropical forests in carbon credit schemes might take pressure off major greenhouse gas (GHG) producers to reduce their own emissions. There was also concern that carbon credits extended to forest plantations might promote clearing of native forests. WWF has backed off that original position and now acknowledges that carbon credit trading could help conserve tropical forests.

Creating a significant dollar value for keeping tropical forests intact may provide governments and land owners with sufficient incentive to overcome the current incentives to clear tropical forests.  These incentives include profits from illegal logging and the high price for palm oil. Oil palm plantations have replaced large areas of lowland tropical forest throughout Southeast Asia, and the exploding biofuels market is putting market pressure on palm oil producers to expand their operations. Lowland forests, especially the kerangas (peat and heath forests) are critically threatened resources, store vast amounts of carbon and become major carbon sinks when converted to oil palm or other uses.

The challenge in placing dollar values on carbon storage in tropical forests, and paying for tropical forest conservation, is ensuring that the money gets to local people and that corruption can be overcome.  Malaysia and Indonesia have strong forest conservation laws on the books, but they are unenforceable due to corruption, with money flowing from forestry and oil palm interests to local and national government officials.  There has to be sufficient income to national governments from carbon trading credits to overcome the economic incentives that lead to corruption.  If money flows only to national governments and corporate interests, and does not benefit local people, any scheme will fail.

The solution to these problems is the same as the solution to the problems of sustainable forestry: reputable third-party certification.  Third party verifiers can produce management plans and provide evidence to carbon credit buyers so that the system can be trusted.

Pervasive corruption throughout the tropical countries that could most benefit from carbon credit purchases will be difficult to overcome, especially in countries like Indonesia with a weak central government and widespread poverty.

I took the photographs below in 1984 in West Kalimantan, Indonesia, showing the vast Kerangas (peat swamp and heath forest) of lowland Borneo in 1984. Most of this forest is now gone. Illegal logging remains rampant.  More pictures are at my photography site.

Links:

Two Nobelists Call for Forest Carbon Market – Dot Earth Blog – NYTimes.com

Avoided Forest Partners

Borneo Forests at Mongabay