Dr Sebastian Gehricke gathered a group of experts from the University of Otago to submit to the new ETS setting for the permanent forest category. It Is great to see the scheme evolve in a way to try and avoid unintended consequences, but there are many more improvements that are more nuanced. Two main suggestions in the submission were:
- Create differentiation in carbon credits or have a native/biodiversity token to be sold alongside credits, for carbon which is sequestered native/sustainable forests.
- Adjust the rules to incentivise/account for the benefits of continuous cover canopy (native or high value exotic), which is a proven forestry management system used by many European countries for better environmental and commercial outcomes.
To find out more on these experts’ thoughts, read the attached submission.
Otago University Researchers Response – Managing exotic afforestation incentives
One comment on “CEFGroup leads Otago researcher submission on ETS consultation “Managing exotic afforestation incentives by changing the forestry settings in the NZ Emissions Trading Scheme””
It is so nice to know about this development on this domain.