Role of Forestry in Combating Climate Change

Earths environment has been undergoing changes due to increasing human population and its activities, the most significant changes being the increase in concentration of carbon dioxide and other green house gases in the troposphere. As the forest are so-called carbon sinks have played a critical role in climate change negotiations and constitute a central element in the scheme to limit atmospheric Greenhouse Gas concentrations set out by the Kyoto Protocol. The IPCC fifth assessment report (2014) clearly identifies the forestry sector as one of the key sectors responsible for Greenhouse Gas emissions, while conserving and reducing forest biomass loss can provide a relatively cheap option for climate change mitigation (Stern, 2007). As 4 billion tones of CO2 are sequestrated in forests and 2.9 billion lost to deforestation and degradation. Today, the use of fossil fuel is responsible for an emission of 7.2 billion tonnes of carbon per year, of which 4.1 accumulate in the atmosphere. At the forest scale, two important concepts must be introduced stock and flux. Many forest activities contribute to climate change mitigation. The rate of carbon sequestration varies among different forests ecosystems and when it comes to carbon sequestration, all trees are not created equal. The amount of carbon a tree sequesters varies based on the growth rate, age, and species of the particular tree. Hence, forestry is not just a bridge to the future, it should be an important part of any control strategy needed to mitigate climate change.